


Persephone's Shadow

by FabulaRasa



Category: DCU
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-07-17
Updated: 2014-07-22
Packaged: 2018-02-09 07:03:04
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 34,944
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1973391
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FabulaRasa/pseuds/FabulaRasa
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This is Part Two of <i><b>In Hades' House</b></i>, which can be found <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/works/1928229/chapters/4163571">here</a>.</p><p>In this part, Clark works to undo Bruce's blindness, and succeeds — at almost unimaginable cost. </p><p>A multi-chapter work.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

"But you are asking us to trade two separate technologies for a single compensation," Ambassador D'Neri said. She spoke regretfully, as if their failure to agree were causing her nothing but profound grief, and yet—what could one do. She made a small gesture of hopelessness with her delicate hands. "Surely you see, it is not reasonable. Surely you see how distressed the Supreme Council would be with me, were I to concede this."

"Distressed," repeated the old, heavily bearded man who was her. . . Clark wasn't quite sure. At times he acted like her subordinate, almost her assistant, and then at others he would catch a sharp sidelong look from the old man to the Ambassador that was watchful, almost reproving, and she would purse her lips. 

"Look," Clark tried again. "I'm sure we can. . . come to some sort of an agreement here. We each have something the other wants—needs, even. That's the important thing."

"But that is the point," the Ambassador said, with infinite sadness. "You have two things you want from us, and there is only one thing we want from you." 

"A _thing_ ," said Green Lantern, beside him. "It's not exactly a _thing_ you want from us, lady, and you can't begin to compare—"

She lifted her index finger, and women in lush brocaded gowns floated into the room, filling the small porcelain bowls in front of them. The Ambassador lifted her arms, widened them into a circle, and clasped them in front of her, head bowed. She remained immobile, the room draped in silence.

Beside him, Clark could practically hear Green Lantern roll his eyes. He had brought Hal because he hadn't wanted to sit alone at this negotiating table, and because he valued Hal's insight—and in truth, his company. But Hal's patience with diplomacy was short, and the elaborate ceremonies and elegant double-speak of New Genesis wore on him. This was now their fifth day of negotiations, and every time Clark thought they were making a breakthrough, there was another tea ceremony to sit through. 

"Kal-El of Krypton," Ambassador D'Neri said, inclining her head to him. It was his turn to drink. This would go on for another sixteen rounds. All he wanted was to pound his head into the table. 

"Please, I beg your forgiveness," Clark said, rising. The tea servers, Ambassador D'Neri, and the old man turned shocked faces to him. "Please forgive my interruption of this. . . beautiful ceremony. But Ambassador, I was wondering if you and I might take a walk together. I find myself in need of fresh air."

A thin pretext, since the room where they met was arched with wide stone colonnades that opened onto the invigorating air of New Genesis; the silken curtains wafted in the breeze from the mountains. And yet she nodded graciously, smiling at him, and took his arm. She drew her hood around her head, as they walked slowly, arm in arm, along the stone walkways that overlooked the city. The golden glow of the suns of New Genesis bathed the city, making it almost as fair and lush as the forests and gardens below it. His own cloak snapped in the breeze. He had worn the full Kryptonian regalia of his house for this meeting; let the people of New Genesis see the insignia of a princely house, and know who they were dealing with. Let them know Earth was not without friends.

"A wise idea, this walk of yours," she said, smiling up at him. She was small for a native of New Genesis, and her smile was warm and wry. "Sometimes a change of scenery can clear the head. And then too, I am weary of the gaze of Sen-Durac, and the Green Lantern—well, he is just weary." She gave a small laugh. "Politics and diplomacy. Who can blame him."

"Ambassador D'Neri," he said, stopping her. They stood on a parapet overlooking the palace of the Highfather, and the wind lifted and swirled the creams and violets of his cloak around them. "What if we. . . extended the terms of the loan?"

Her keen eyes considered him. "You are empowered to make such an offer?"

"Who else would be?"

"It must be doubled," she said. "It is two entirely separate technologies you wish from us, so the terms must be doubled."

Clark turned and gripped the parapet. The stones were old, and crumbled slightly, everywhere he touched them. The rock of this world had a fine, powdery feel to it, almost as though it had been baked to softness over the long millennia by the rays of the twin suns. The stones stayed warm for hours into the night, even as the wind chilled the city's inhabitants. It was not an unpleasant place to be. A kind of Eden, in many ways. The mountain wind smelled of sweet flowers whose names he did not know.

"And if I say yes," he said. "If I agree, how soon could you make this transfer?"

She pursed her lips. "Two of your Earth weeks. I promise I do not delay. The Council will rather be shocked at my precipitousness."

"You can make them agree to this?"

A gentle shrug. "I can make them do much. But a stipulation."

He sighed. Because of course. "The first technology transfer will take place in two weeks. The second will take place at the beginning of the second loan period, in six months. We will not part with both at once. We will wish to see whether our acquisition is satisfactory."

"Acquisition," Clark said with a scowl, and she held up her hand. 

"My apologies, please. I am the daughter of a merchantman, and I grew up haggling in a marketplace. The language of business coarsens the tongue, as Sen-Durac is always reminding me."

He looked toward the purple shadow of the mountains and breathed in the wind. "Then we agree," he said. "A delay in the transfer is acceptable. We must learn to trust each other."

Her arm tightened on his. "It is not a trusting universe we inhabit, Kal-El."

"No, it is not. But trust begins like this: with two people reaching out their hands. Do you trust me, Ambassador D'Neri?"

She did not answer at first; she stood beside him on the parapet and shared the view in silence. "I was not born on this world, Kal-El," she said after a while. "Like you, my home world is an adopted one. I was born on Apokolips, and rescued from that hellish place. I know what it is to love your adopted world with everything in you, and I know what it is to be a stranger among them, too." She turned back to him. "I think, yes," she said. "I do trust you, Kal-El of Krypton and Earth."

He extended his hand. "Then—as your merchant father might have said—do we have a deal?"

She smiled back. "Indeed, we have a deal. And may this small exchange be the first of many."

"Well," he said with a slight laugh, "we'll see. I expect my negotiating partner will be as unhappy as yours." 

"Oh, I doubt that," she sighed, shading her eyes against the wind as Sen-Durac stuck his leonine head out one of the archways, searching for her. Of course, Clark was right; Lantern was furious with him, and ranted for hours—the entire trip home, it seemed—about the lowlife lying ways of everyone in the Lambda Sector, the poor negotiating skills of Kryptonians, the sorry quality of the food on New Genesis, and most of all, about Clark's own blindness to the possibility of betrayal. Clark listened to all of it patiently, responded to some, and ignored most of it. It was nothing he didn't worry about himself, nothing he hadn't already said to himself. The risk of betrayal was real, but he meant what he had said to D'Neri: this was how progress was made, one halting step at a time. Not that he cared all that much about peaceful intergalactic trade; his agenda was decidedly more limited.

Of course, if it was betrayal Hal was worried about, Clark had already experienced the worst of that. What betrayal could bite keener than when a man's own dog turned against him?

"Oh, for the love of—Clark," Bruce had growled, and somehow when Bruce said it there were about nineteen r's in his name. "Get your goddamn dog out of here." 

Krypto had bounded into the study, an awkwardly large, overly furred ball of enthusiasm and drool, and if anyone was ever less a dog person than Bruce Wayne, Clark had never met him. "Sorry," Clark said. "I've just been away all week, and I figured, since I was going to be spending today over here, maybe I could take him along? I'll let him run in the gardens, he won't bother anyone, I promise."

"I don't want your goddamn dog shitting all over Alfred's flowers. Shedding everywhere, too, probably," Bruce said with a wince, brushing at his pants where Krypto's large head had nuzzled at his knee. "Tie him to a tree or something. Listen, I have something to show you. Those schematics we talked about day before yesterday—I worked on them on my pad, and printed them out for you to take a look at. They're on my desk somewhere in the study, a stack of them. I bent the corner of the pages, so I could tell which ones. I need you to look at them. I know you're not an engineer, but you have a perfectly adequate head for logic."

"Stop it, you're embarrassing me," Clark said. "Yeah, I want to see what—Kryp, no, come back here, come back boy! Sorry, he takes a notion sometimes." Krypto had hared off down the hallway like his stupid furry balls were on fire, and Clark winced, waiting for the crash of a priceless porcelain vase. "I'll just go, you know. . ."

"You do that," said Bruce with a menacing glare. But then Krypto bounded back, almost knocking Clark over in his enthusiasm, and parked himself at Bruce's knee. He had some papers in his mouth, which he placed carefully on Bruce's lap. Clark's eyebrows shot to the ceiling. 

"Is that. . ."

"I believe it is," said Bruce. Krypto's tail was wagging, and he was staring at Bruce with a big doggy grin. "Clark. Does your dog understand English, by any chance?"

"Not that I've ever noticed. I mean, he's obviously not your average dog, but I didn't know he could do that. Krypto. Here, boy."

But the dog was ignoring him. He was cocking his head at Bruce, waiting for something. Finally he rested his heavy head on Bruce's leg. "Good. . . boy," Bruce said, and hesitantly patted his head. Krypto's body exploded in shivering wags. "I wouldn't mind that pad of computations to the left of the phone," he said to Krypto, and the dog quickly trotted off. "It's probably unreadable, since I was in all likelihood making a mess of it, but it might help you decode some of the trickier passages in those print-outs. It might even help you see if and where I've gone wrong in any of it, if there's a chance that—"

Krypto returned, and dropped the pad in Bruce's lap. He sat and cocked his head like before. Bruce reached out a hand, and scratched the fur of his ears. "All right, we get the point," he said. Krypto scooted closer, and managed to maneuver most of the front part of his body into Bruce's lap. "For heaven's sake," sighed Bruce, but he didn't immediately shove him off, and even gave him a few more absent scratches. 

There were no more complaints about shedding or shitting, and by the end of the day, when Clark was ready to leave, he wandered into the study to say good-bye and found Bruce stretched out on the sofa, his Braille keyboard in his lap and his pad resting on the floor, with Krypto stretched more or less on top of him, sound asleep. "Don't let him hurt your leg," Clark said.

"He's fine," was all Bruce said.

"Well. He's probably a little starved for human contact. He stays at the Fortress, most of the time, and he's probably just hungry for. . ." Krypto raised his massive head and looked right at him, blinking once. Those eyes were large and steady. "You know," said Clark. "If you wouldn't mind, could he stay here for a bit? Just a day or so. I have that conference to go to, in Seattle."

"For God's sake," Bruce grumbled. "If he breaks anything, I'm billing it to you." Krypto re-settled his head, squirming it more or less under Bruce's hand. _He's giving him the same sort of touch I did_ , Clark realized. _Krypto knows what he needs._ He watched Bruce's finger scratch Krypto off-handedly behind the ear. Clark was seized with an odd feeling, before he recognized he was jealous. Of a dog. It was a new lifetime low. 

"Take good care of him," he said to Bruce, but he was looking at Krypto, who looked steadily back at him. "Traitor," Clark whispered. 

When he came back from his journalism conference in Seattle, he didn't say anything about coming to pick up Krypto, and Bruce didn't mention it.


	2. The Price of Light

"Too goddamn risky. This was too risky." Dick's eyes were narrowed at him in suspicion, and it was like all the progress the two of them had made in the last six months had been erased, and they were back to standing outside Bruce's hospital room, arguing in low furious tones.

"Yes," Clark acknowledged. "I never said it wasn't. But it was a risk Bruce was willing to assume. This wasn't my decision, it was his. He wanted to try this."

Dick's snort was eloquent. "Of course he did. You offer him his life back, of course he's going to say yes. What's going to happen when it doesn't work?"

"Bruce is aware that the odds this will be unsuccessful are substantial." 

"He trusts you. And since this was your idea, of course he was going to try it. What did you think would happen?"

"What I thought would happen was that Bruce would make his own decision, and he did." He had to bite back a sharper retort; they weren't alone, and for all that they were talking in an undertone, the others in the hall were glancing at them. Hal was talking quietly to Barry and Shayera; Diana was pacing, at the far end of the hall. He didn't know where J'onn was, but maybe the man had some idea that Bruce would prefer some privacy, an idea clearly lost on the others. Closest to him, Ambassador D'Neri and an attendant he didn't recognize were standing, staring patiently at nothing, probably lost in meditation. 

"Ready," said Leslie curtly, sticking her head out the door. The New Genesians filed in first, to Dick's evident irritation. Clark took up a position in the back. The others moved slowly, unable to see much of anything in the small pitch-blackened room. Bruce was sitting on the hospital bed, his eyes bandaged. Leslie crouched in front of him. 

"Okay," she said, a hand on his knee. "I'm going to remove the bandages, and I want you to open your eyes when you feel comfortable doing so. The room is dark, because I want to introduce light gradually. We need to be careful not to light-blind you, or cause any damage. So don't worry if you can't see anything at first."

Bruce nodded, and she started unwrapping the bandages. Clark could see him blink rapidly. "All right," she said. "Any pain?"

"None."

"Excellent. Now I'm going to raise the lights, just one and a half degrees. You might start to be able to distinguish shadows, maybe shapes. I'm going to leave it there for a few minutes, to let your eyes adjust. If at any point it's too much, tell me to stop."

"And if there's nothing." Bruce's voice was flat.

"If there's nothing," and Clark saw her squeeze his knee, "then we deal with that. Okay, here we go. Lights to one point five," she said, more loudly. Everything came into sharp focus, for Clark, but the others probably saw only a fainter black. Leslie rested there, looking intently at Bruce, who did not move. The room was silent. 

"Okay," she said after a bit. "Let's try two degrees."

"Aren't you going to hold up fingers or something?"

Leslie's voice was tight. "Let's wait on that. Lights to two."

"Are you not holding up fingers because you weren't wearing that ring six months ago, and I might ask just how serious things had gotten with that anesthesiologist at Gotham General?"

Clark heard the room's collective sigh, an exhale that was half a laugh. He felt a wash of cold, then warm. There were too many happy, racing heartbeats in the room for him to distinguish Bruce's. "Lights to two," Leslie repeated, more loudly, and now the room was awash in grayish light. He could see Bruce wince, squinting a bit, and he had never seen anything more beautiful in his life. He closed his own eyes in the most sincere prayer of thankfulness he had ever uttered, and knew that whatever happened after this, his own core of joy was untouchable, unalterable.

"Okay, I'm going to hold off examining with light, because I think that will definitely be painful. Let's just do some basic looking around first, see if we can't retrain your eyes. There are some other people in the room. Can you tell me their names?"

"Dick Grayson," said Bruce, and Dick, at his left, put a hand on his shoulder. Bruce reached for his cane and stood. He blinked repeatedly as he looked around. He frowned at the New Genesians, clearly puzzled. "Barry Allen," he said, and Flash grinned. "Diana Prince. Hal Jordan. Shayera Hol." Shayera bowed deeply, and he inclined his head. Bruce frowned, turned around. His eyes found Clark, leaning against the wall, near the door. Clark saw him swallow. 

He made his careful way over to Clark, until he was standing right in front of him. "Clark Kent," he said. Clark tried to say something, but Bruce's eyes were right there, and they were seeing him, truly _seeing_ him, it was _Bruce_ looking at him, the same way he always did. Clark opened his mouth to speak, but could not. 

Bruce seized him into an embrace, crushing him. Bruce's arms were enfolding him, and he wrapped Bruce back. "Thank you," Bruce whispered. "Thank you." Clark's arms were trembling. He would never let him go, and Bruce just held on tighter. Who cared what anyone thought, who honestly gave a shit. He put a hand on the back of Bruce's neck, and Bruce did the same, tipped their foreheads together. 

"I want my dog back," Clark whispered, and the room erupted in laughter. Bruce laughed too, and the crinkles at the corners of his eyes were so beautiful, his sharp ice-blue eyes so perfect. 

"The technology transfer was successful, then," said Ambassador D'Neri. Bruce released Clark reluctantly, and turned to her. "Emenvor," she said, with a nod to her attendant, who was at Clark's side instantly. 

"Come," said Emenvor. The young man was larger even than Clark, and he put a heavy hand on Clark's wrist. "It is time."

"Not yet," said Clark, through furiously gritted teeth. "D'Neri."

"What's going on?" said Bruce.

"It's fine," said Clark. "Just last-minute negotiations, everything's fine."

"There are no further negotiations, Kal-El," said D'Neri firmly. "You gave your word. The time is now."

"The time is _not_ now," Clark said. "We said at a time agreeable to the proprietor—"

"Which is now the people of New Genesis."

"Which is still me, and I say—"

"Clark, what the hell is going on!" Bruce's voice rose above the others, and Clark saw him look to the others in the dim room, who were just as confused as he—except for Hal, who dropped his eyes, and Bruce saw that too. 

"Twenty-four hours," Clark said, low and intent, right at D'Neri. "I gave my word. You said we had trust. I am telling you, twenty-four hours and I will be ready. That is all I ask. It is a small price to pay. I swear to you, on my honor."

She nodded at Emenvor, who removed his hand. She gathered her robes. "If you break your word," she said, and her voice was steel, "we take back what is ours." She glanced at Bruce, who was staring narrowly at her. "And we will not be as. . . surgical, in our removal," she said. "Emenvor, come."

They swept from the room. "Clark, what the hell is—" Dick began, but Bruce held up a hand.

"Give us the room," he said. Whether it was his tone of command, or the old habit of obeying Batman, they all filed out, even Leslie, and Bruce kept his eyes on Clark. 

"What did you do," he said quietly, when the door was shut.

"It isn't for long," Clark said. He watched Bruce absorb this. 

"You sold yourself."

"I did not." Clark's voice rose. "It was a diplomatic agreement, a negotiation. There are projects on New Genesis, plate tectonic shiftings that can help with their climate, their irrigation—there are things they need that I can do for them, that the strength of a Kryptonian under a yellow sun can do. It's only for a while. I'll go help them for a little bit, and then I'll be back, and I will have—I can help them tremendously, I can—"

"You bought my sight, and you were the price." 

"Please. Try to understand this."

"I understand it perfectly." Bruce leaned on his cane and studied Clark. He had forgotten how utterly disemboweling that gaze could feel. "There is really zero that I am misunderstanding about this situation."

Part of Clark wanted to laugh, because how familiar did this feel—the two of them butting heads again. That sure hadn't taken long. "Look," said Clark, "if I'm the best bargaining chip Earth can bring to the table, then so be it, I'm ready and willing to assume that—"

"Except that you weren't bargaining for Earth," Bruce said, with his unerring instinct for slicing through Clark's bullshit. "You were bargaining for me. And you lied to me."

That was one Clark did not have an answer for, and he dropped his eyes. "I did not—if I had disclosed to you the full extent of the negotiations—"

"Meaning if you had told me the price, I would have said no."

Clark clenched his jaw. "Meaning. . . if I had told you the price, you would have said no."

Bruce just kept leaning on his cane and looking at him. "You don't know your own history," he said.

"Bruce—"

" _You don't know your own history!_ " It was an angry shout, punctuated by the crash of Bruce's cane on the hospital table. "You don't know," he repeated. "New Genesians kept Kryptonians as slaves. They enslaved Kryptonians for generations, for thousands of years. That ended barely five generations ago, that's the blink of an eye for New Genesis. You are lying to yourself if you think they look at you and see anything other than a piece of property, and as far as they're concerned they just bought you. You _idiot_ ," Bruce growled.

"I know that history as well as you do, you think I don't know that?"

"I think that with everything in you, you believe you are from Kansas, and that what happened to Kryptonians hundreds of years ago doesn't have anything to do with you. This isn't a story that happened to someone else, it happened to _you_ , and if they have their way, it will happen again."

"No." Clark shook his head. "They will stand by their agreement, I do know that. The agreement is the loan of my powers, and my presence on New Genesis, for a period of time only, and it isn't—"

"How long."

"Two Earth years."

He saw Bruce blanch at that, saw him visibly pale. "It—it's not like it's the worst thing that ever happened, it's a very beautiful place, really, and everyone I've met there has been nothing but—nothing but—" He faltered. He put his forehead in his hand. "I'm sorry," he said. "I'm sorry. You're right. I lied. I wish I could say I wouldn't do it again, but I would. Okay? I would. I just. . . I couldn't think of anything else. Sometimes there isn't any other answer. You know that better than anyone."

"And if it had been five years," Bruce said hoarsely. "Or ten."

"Then I would have paid it."

"Goddamn you to hell. Goddamn you to hell for doing this." 

Clark shut his eyes. Even this, even this he could take. He hadn't expected Bruce to thank him. A few minutes ago, when Bruce had said "thank you," he had felt like such a cheat, taking the thanks he knew Bruce would never give, if he knew the truth. Such a sad hypocritical cheat he was. "I know you're angry," he said. "You have every right to be. But please—I don't think I can do this with you hating me. Just—don't hate me, please."

"You think I hate you," Bruce said. 

_I think I have no idea what the hell you feel when you look at me_ , he wanted to say, but this was not the time. Or maybe it was. He didn't know any more. All he knew was that Bruce could see, and there wasn't any price he wouldn't have paid. "Lights to three," Bruce said, and the room had a soft yellow glow now. Bruce squinted at it a bit, blinked and shielded his eyes, but quickly adjusted. "Strange how not strange it is," he murmured, looking at his hand, turning it this way and that. He looked at Clark again. Clark was just standing there with his arms crossed.

"Hal knows," Bruce said.

"Yes. He was with me in the negotiations. You think I was ignorant of what I was doing, but I wasn't. You think I was ignorant of my people's history, but I wasn't. I did this with my eyes open."

"Yes," Bruce said. "I see that." For a while Clark thought he wasn't going to say anything more. He had his hand on his mouth, like he did when he was thinking. "Why two years?" he asked. "Like you said, they could have asked more and you would probably have given it. Why did they stop at two years of your life?"

"Oh." He colored. "That was because. . . I lied."

Bruce cocked a brow. "On a roll, aren't we."

"Yes. Well, as it turns out, I discovered the New Genesians have. . . an extraordinary reverence for, ah, marriage."

"You told them you were married."

"Yes."

"To whom?"

"Ah, that's the part I haven't. . . the thing is—"

"You told them you were married to me."

"Yes," he acknowledged. "It explained why I was negotiating so strenuously for the use of this technology in one individual, and it also forced them to curtail the terms of my—service." 

Bruce was silent again, just looking at him. Clark looked back at him. "You didn't lie," Bruce said. He sat on the edge of the hospital bed, and extended his leg, rubbed at the joint. _I negotiated for the technology to fix that too_ , Clark almost said, but figured Bruce would lose what tenuous control on his temper he had. 

"Well," Clark said. "God knows we fight like it."

"That's certainly true."

"Bruce." Clark knelt in front of him. "I need you to stop pretending like you wouldn't have done exactly the same thing I did."

"Probably I would have, but for a different reason."

"The reason matters?"

"Yes, the reason matters," said Bruce with a scowl, though whether at him or the pain in his leg, Clark was unsure. "The fact is, you did this out of your misplaced sense of guilt, and persuaded yourself it was for more noble reasons."

"My misplaced— _guilt?_ Bruce, what the ever-living hell are you talking about? This is not about my guilt because I didn't protect you, or didn't rescue you in time—I realize I didn't cause what happened to you, all right, I am not five years old, I am capable of—right, I remember now, you don't believe in self-sacrifice, except when you're magnetizing yourself to a nuclear missile or crashing the Watchtower into the earth or a spaceship into an asteroid or some other stupid-ass—"

"Your guilt at not returning my feelings, is what I mean."

That sucker-punched the wind right out of him. 

"You think. . . oh. Oh, Jesus." He bowed his head to Bruce's leg. "Wow."

"All those nights, lying together, and you never touched me," Bruce said softly. "I know you thought about it, but you didn't, and I. . . know the reasons. Clark. It's all right. I know that what you feel is not—what I feel. I came to terms with that a very long time ago. I'm not going to keep throwing myself at you in a variety of painfully unsubtle ways. But the answer to that is not to sell yourself into goddamn slavery, and you're a moron if you think it is."

"I—" 

"What sort of idiot does something like that? You're a walking object lesson in why emotions are, nine times out of ten, a dangerous distraction indulged by the weak."

"That—"

"Honestly, Kent, your reasoning skills are lodged somewhere in the general vicinity of middle school, if you believe that the best response to—"

" _Enzakh ishtab iz kin lyagren_."

He watched that crash into Bruce, saw his words stutter into stunned silence. Clark seized his moment, because it wouldn't come again. He reached to pull Bruce in, a hand on the back of his neck, and leaned his forehead against Bruce's. He enunciated each word, as slowly as he could. " _Enzakh. . . ishtab. . . iz kin—_ "

"Don't say what you don't mean," whispered Bruce.

"Stop telling me what I mean. Bruce. . . do you not want—"

Bruce's mouth covered his with a sound that was—it wasn't a moan, exactly, but a heavy rush of air, and it went right to Clark's cock. Sensation was whited out. He was lost in Bruce's mouth. His fingers on Bruce's head were probably hurting. He pushed into Bruce's mouth so hard he tipped them back on the bed. He climbed on top of Bruce and just kept kissing. He pressed his body into Bruce, pushed his hands up Bruce's shirt to warm skin. 

"Twenty-four hours," Bruce whispered. 

"You think you know what I feel," Clark said. "You have no fucking idea."

"Clarify for me," said Bruce, and pulled him back down. Clark started rubbing into him, grinding their hips together. Bruce's hands were slipping inside the waist of his pants. 

"Oh Christ," Clark gasped. His cock was aching, and they had been kissing for maybe a minute and a half. "Fuck." He pushed his hardness into the answering hardness beneath him, and Bruce was getting hard for him, Bruce's glorious cock was hard for him and getting harder. His hips had a movement of their own. Bruce's fingers digging into his ass were not gentle.

"Hang on," Bruce whispered. "I need—" He winced, trying to maneuver himself, which was not easy under Clark. The leg, of course. Clark lifted them both, hovering a few inches above the uncomfortable mattress, until they were stretched out in the other direction, with Bruce's leg supported now instead of dangling over the edge. 

"Better?" 

"Not yet," Bruce growled, and pulled Clark's hips down harder.

"Hang on, genius," Clark said with a small smile, and got a hand in between them to unzip them both. There was still fabric in between them, but it was better than before. "Shit, Bruce, I—fuck, I can't stop, is this okay, tell me this is okay."

"Hell yes. Come on, move." Clark's grinding was desperate now.

"I promise I can go slower," he gasped. "I promise I can—shit, you feel so good." He turned his head, bit his lip hard. Bruce's hand was on the side of his face.

"What's wrong?"

"Nothing. I'm just—close. Trying to—fuck." He bit his lip harder, and Bruce's thumb swiped at it. Bruce's arm locked around his neck and pulled him down. Bruce's kiss sucked air from his lungs.

"There's such a thing as waiting too long," Bruce husked in his ear. "Let's just get off, all right?"

And it was the quality of Bruce's voice that tipped him over the edge, the little shake of need buried in it. Clark gripped Bruce's hips with a moan and rocked into them, grinding shamelessly. 

"You didn't lie," Bruce said. "Tell me you know it wasn't a lie."

"It wasn't," Clark said. "Fuck—Bruce, I can't stop, I'm going to—"

"Fuck yes," Bruce groaned, and there it was, _there_ was his sweet spot, right in the raw sex of Bruce's voice; Clark was spurting thick and wet into his own shorts and against the hot slide of cock on the other side. His orgasm shook the back of his knees and ripped a sound from his throat probably audible three floors away.

"Holy shit," he panted, when he had air again. His head was collapsed onto Bruce's shoulder. And also, he realized that Bruce beneath him was still taut as a bowstring. Wow, he was a selfish piece of shit. "Hang on," he said, and got a hand in between them again. They were both sticky with his come. Man, he was a class act, from first to last. "I got you," he whispered, and his questing hand slipped inside Bruce's shorts, wrapped a hand around Bruce's cock, his beautiful, thick, achingly hard cock, like wet silk in his hand.

Bruce put a hand on Clark's wrist. "I'm on—a lot of vicodin," he said. "I don't know that—I really can."

"You can," Clark said, and slid down Bruce's body—God, he was a beautiful mess, come all over him, pants undone, shirt halfway up his chest—to swallow his cock.

"Clark Clark Clark," panted Bruce, pushing at his shoulders, but Clark just suckled harder. He knew Bruce did not need gentle right now. It would have worked better if Bruce had been smaller, but there was no way to swallow all of him, so Clark settled for a rough hand at his base as his mouth worked his upper shaft. The suction should have been painful, but Bruce just arched and pushed with his heel at the mattress. He pressed down on Clark's shoulders with a strength that even Clark could feel, and the thought that Bruce was letting himself go like this, unleashing his body's strength like he couldn't with anyone else. . . he moaned around Bruce's cock, and Bruce was pulling at his hair, trying desperately to lift him off, but Clark was having none of it. Bruce's orgasm was long and slow and seemed like it was being pulled from the middle of his body. Clark swallowed him all, and felt the moment of his bonelessness. Bruce's pure pleasure was the hottest thing he had ever seen. 

He sat up and waited for Bruce's eyes. Bruce had a hand on his arm, and they watched each other. "Even if I came up with a way for you not to go, you would still go, wouldn't you," Bruce said at last. Clark was pretty impressed; normally it took him five minutes after coming to remember the category _noun_ , and here Bruce was forming conditionals and everything. 

"I gave my word," was all he said. "Look, we have twenty-four hours. I don't want to spend it arguing about this."

"Twenty-three hours and forty minutes." Bruce sat up and curled an arm around Clark's neck. He checked his watch, over Clark's head. "Just enough time for me to get hard again."

Clark laughed, and had a bit of trouble stopping. He bent his head to Bruce's shoulder. He felt the brush of Bruce's lips against his neck. "It's not a joke," Bruce whispered. "None of this is a joke, you idiot."

"I know it."

"Here's what we're going to do," Bruce said. "For now, we're going to get back to the Manor. When we get there, I'm going to beat the ever-living shit out of you, for doing this to us. Then I'm going to fuck you until you forget your own name. Both of them. Then I will beat you some more. Then possibly more fucking. In between, we will shower."

Clark brushed his fingers against Bruce's hair. How could anyone be this beautiful? He was drunk with it, with the nearness of Bruce, with the smell of his skin, the taste of his mouth. Bruce's eyes saw him, watched him, pierced every part of him. Clark leaned to kiss the lids that fluttered shut. He didn't say _forgive me_ , because he knew Bruce hadn't. He knew Bruce wouldn't, any more than he would have forgiven it, had Bruce done something like this to him. 

"Don't ever lie to me again," Bruce said.


	3. Chapter 3

Bruce lay waking in the pre-dawn dark, and knew that Clark did not sleep either. They didn't speak, but he knew the time as well as Clark, and knew how many hours were left. He didn't say, _there are some things I need to tell you_ , because everything had been said: everything bodies and mouths could say, had been said in the last fourteen hours, and they floated now in the tide. Clark's head lay on his chest, and they were silent. 

Clark's hand absently stroked his arm. "How are the eyes," he murmured after a while.

"Fine. Still a little light sensitive, but not much. You should sleep."

"Mm. I will if you will."

"I can sleep later. You might not be able to."

Clark hesitated. "If in two years' time. . ."

"You should shut up now."

"Just saying." 

They drifted some more, and Bruce counted breaths. The rise of his chest pushed against the exhale of Clark's. Clark's softened, sated cock nestled against his thigh. Clark's hand was straying down to play absently with Bruce's cock curled in his groin, petting it, stroking it. "Yeah, good luck there," Bruce said with a soft laugh. 

"Can't I just touch you, then."

"Anywhere." 

Clark had, of course. That had taken him aback more than anything—the way Clark touched his body, the way Clark looked at him naked. Scarred, flawed, crippled; all the toll the last six months had taken on his muscle definition, his strength. Bruce was not vain, but he had never been unaware of what he looked like. And he was aware now of what he wasn't. But Clark had licked, kissed, suckled every inch of him like he was holy ground. 

And such shame he had felt: not just at what he looked like now, but at what he could not do. His mobility in bed had been more severely limited than he had reckoned. Everything he had wanted to do—throw Clark on the bed and fuck him into the following week, mainly—was not possible, given how unable his leg was to support his weight, and how painful it was to keep the damn thing bent, for any length of time. So instead of the vicious fucking that had been the fodder of his masturbatory fantasies for years, there was only slow and gentle, with Bruce lying half on his side, and Clark curled behind him, and it should have been deeply unsexy but was in fact possibly the hottest thing he had ever done. He had come like a firehose, Clark's hand jerking him just slightly faster than those deep slow rhythmic thrusts unmaking him, until he had felt unstrung, out of control, and just leaned his head back and fucked himself on that firm cock, fucked forward into that warm hand.

"Jesus Christ, _Bruce_ ," Clark had groaned. "You think I didn't want to touch you, it's all I want, you're all I— _fuck_ ," and he had felt it, felt Clark coming in him even before the fingers on his hip had dug in to bone. But his goddamn leg, his goddamn leg. He couldn't even comfortably crawl down Clark's body to suck him. And when he had managed to find a position that worked for him, his leg had actually chosen that particular moment to spasm like a motherfucker, and he had had to lift his head and grip the sheets while Clark said _what's wrong, tell me what's wrong_ in that frantic voice. In the end the only thing he had been able to swallow was another fistful of vicodin. 

"Six months out, it shouldn't hurt like this," Clark had said, stroking his head as he lay there, beyond humiliated. "You need to talk to Leslie. I didn't know it was still—I shouldn't have left, goddamn I'm sorry, I'm so sorry," because Clark would always assume everything was his fault, Clark would always assume he was supposed to fix everything. When they had first met, there had been nothing about the man that had irritated him more—or, truthfully, intrigued him more. Because of course, what would you think, if you had grown up like Clark? When you could do everything, why wouldn't you eventually think that you should do everything? But not in this bed; here would be where the weight of the world left his shoulders. He would not be another problem for Clark to solve. 

"I'll be fine in a minute," he had said. 

"It's all right. We could just lie here and talk about our feelings, if you want." That had shaken a bark of a laugh from Bruce, and jolted him past his embarrassment. Because that, too, Clark could do. 

"I'll be better at this, next time," Bruce said. Clark had pulled him close, and attached his mouth somewhere below Bruce's ear, murmuring into his neck. 

"Bruce. I don't think you understand. You walk into a room, and I'm hard. I'm betting you could bring me off with your voice alone. Lying naked next to you is probably the single most erotic experience of my life. Muscle movement completely optional."

"This muscle works just fine," Bruce had said, closing his hand around Clark's still-leaking cock. If he had thought Clark was beautiful just lying there, watching Clark come undone with pleasure had convinced him no more beautiful creature breathed on the face of the planet. Clark's chest heaved, his hips rocked, his lips parted, his arms shook. Bruce would slow down just to watch Clark's eyes fly open, to hear his small groan.

"God, I used to—think about this," Clark gasped, and Bruce rewarded him with a firmer, faster hand. 

"Is that so. Tell me what you thought about."

"I would— _God_ —sometimes I would let myself think, at night, when I would, ah—"

"Jack off."

"Yeah, that you were—there, in the shadows, and you would—reach out your hand and— _God_ , what your hand would feel like—" Clark thrashed.

"Tame," said Bruce.

"Okay," Clark panted. "This, then. We would be—ah—at the conference table on the Watchtower—"

"Better."

"And I was sitting next to you, like I always do, and you would lean back, like you were—don't stop—thinking about something, and instead your hand would—cup me under the table, and you would— _fuck_ —bring me off under the table, without anyone knowing, and I would have to come because it felt too good, so damn good—"

Bruce shifted closer. "You want fingers?" he asked, and Clark's groan shivered the mattress. He had had no idea Clark had that kind of mouth on him until he had three fingers up his ass and a hand on his cock, but Clark's string of _Jesus fuck yes you bastard yes come on fuck me I can't I can't fuck fuck oh Christ_ went straight to his own cock. His hand was still slick with Clark's come when he fisted himself, hard and fast. Clark had even rolled his direction, bleary and come-smeared, in order to watch, and Bruce had gritted his teeth and come hard, slopping heavy over his own hand, and Clark had groaned at that. He had reached for Bruce, pulled him closer. "You are so fucking beautiful, how can you be so goddamn sexy," Clark murmured, and he took Bruce's come-spattered fingers and licked them. 

So. Not perfect, but not terrible. In two years' time, they would try this again. Much could happen in two years. 

Clark was walking into danger, eyes steady. Walking for him. If a hair on Clark's head was harmed, he would tear out the core of their sorry planet and hurl it into the next galaxy. He could see the moon over the gardens, from where he lay. And out the corner of the window, he could see the edge of the master suite's set of windows, in the opposite wing. The same moon was sliding over his parents' bed, right now, in that long-silent room. Had they ever lain in their bed, like this, one cradled in the other's arms, hating the slow inevitable crawl of the clock? 

"How can I sleep," Clark whispered against his chest, "when you're brooding this loud?"

"What are you talking about, I'm brooding quietly. This is stealth mode."

Clark's sleep-warm hand brushed his face. "Need a shave," he said. 

"Yes, I wonder why maybe I have not been the best at shaving recently."

"Wasn't complaining." He heard Clark stifle his yawn. 

"When you get back," he said. "Would you consider moving back to the Manor?" He kept his tone as light and soft as he could. 

"Mm. Do I still get my pick of the rooms in the south wing?"

"If you want. Though I was thinking, maybe you would prefer this one."

Clark stretched, then curled tighter into his side, a heavy arm draped across him now. "I'd hate to do that. I wouldn't want to throw you out of your own room."

"Asshole." Bruce swatted at his head.

"I do like your bathroom, though."

They said nothing for a while, and Bruce wondered if Clark's bantering response was his answer. If it was, he wasn't going to leave it there. He should leave it there. There was no reason for him to want more. But Clark had said the words. He had said them, on the Watchtower, those five words.

"I was thinking," Bruce said, and "uh oh," said Clark, just a gust of air into his chest hair. "I was thinking, you have the most personal integrity of anyone I've ever known."

Clark said nothing to that, at first. "You know why I have to be careful of—"

"Because you have more power than anyone else, yes, I get that. But what I mean is, a lie doesn't sit well with you. It never has."

"Bruce." Clark lifted his head. "I said I wouldn't, ever again. But I don't know what else to say, because I can't pretend that I'm sorry that—"

"Shut up. I'm not talking about that, I'm talking about your lie to the New Genesians."

"Ah." Clark re-settled. "Thought we agreed it wasn't."

"We did. I just thought we might see about making objective reality correspond to. . . subjective perceptions."

"Okay," Clark said.

"What I'm asking is—"

"I said okay, did you think the words were too big?"

"No, but I thought I might have been too subtle."

Clark flopped over onto his back. "Too subtle," he said, and he was shaking. The bastard was actually laughing. "Is that—is that something you get a lot, accusations of subtlety? From whom, Gorilla Grodd? Because you, my friend—"

"Forget it, deal's off," Bruce said, securing a pillow firmly over his face. He could hear Clark still laughing underneath it. 

"Okay, I said okay—no wait, let me up, come on, I said okay—" Clark's muffled voice sounded not remotely chastened, and still, unbelievably, like laughing.

"Asshole," muttered Bruce, replacing the pillow with his mouth.

* * *

It was full dawn when he slipped out of the bed and pulled his clothes on. He kept his cane as quiet as he could on the floor. Clark was finally, blessedly asleep, sprawled on his stomach in the wide bed. He couldn't let him sleep long, but Clark could have at least these next two hours undisturbed, and Bruce was determined he should rest. Whatever Clark's optimism about what awaited him on New Genesis, Bruce did not share it.

The question, of course, was this: did New Genesis still possess kryptonite? Kryptonite was how they had subdued the Kryptonians they managed to capture and enslave, but when the treaties between Krypton and New Genesis had been signed, and when New Genesis had forsworn all slaving, part of the deal had been the destruction of their reserves of kryptonite. For at least a hundred years thereafter, the planet had even been regularly inspected by Kryptonian delegations, to make sure the reserves were indeed empty. But rocks were an easy thing to hide. It would have taken nothing more than a handful of determined bureaucrats; it would have taken only one. It could be they had figured out a way to subvert the Kryptonian scans, and secrete a small cache somewhere. 

_You're being paranoid_ , Clark would say. _And you're too trusting_ , he would reply, the responses to the old argument automatic by now. Even if Clark had suspected they had kryptonite, even if he had known, he still would have made the deal, because that was just what Clark did. Bruce slowly walked the long upstairs gallery, pondering again the possibility of an antidote to kryptonite. Theoretically, it should be possible. But he had never pursued it. He had never pursued it, and Clark knew why. 

Bruce took the elevator to the Batcave, and stood in its chilled musty dark for the first time in six months. He could use the cave's database to research the question of New Genesian access to kryptonite, but he was here for another reason this morning. He had had just enough time, after Clark had finally fallen asleep, to begin making his calls, to arrange things. This was the final piece.

He stood at the small sliding-rock entrance to the cave's private quarters, and for a moment thought he might not be admitted; Dick might have changed the scanners to admit only him. But at the last second the doors slid aside, like they always did. He had forgotten about the narrowness of the stairs, and managed them only with difficulty. 

The bedroom door stood open, and he limped in, ignoring the throb in his leg from that final twist on the stairs. Dick was curled under a mountain of blankets, looking, as always, twenty years younger in his sleep. Or maybe it was that he would always look nine, to Bruce. How many nights had he sat in the chair in Dick's room upstairs, until he fell asleep? For months, it seemed like, he and Alfred had switched off night duty with Dick, waiting to beat back the nightmares. 

_He says it's the house_ , Alfred had told him at last, and Bruce had put down his coffee with a scowl.

 _The house? What, the boy wants to live somewhere else?_ Odd what a pang that had given him, like someone sliding a knife under his rib.

 _No no_ , said Alfred, raising his brows. _He says it's too large._

_What's too large?_

Alfred had spread his hands. _Everything, apparently. The rooms, especially. Master Bruce, I think the little lad is terrified. He wouldn't have you know for the world. Said you called him fearless the other day, doesn't want to disappoint you._

Bruce had considered. _Make up the valet's room for him, then. That's small, ought to be cozy enough._

 _And much more close by_ , Alfred had pointed out. _I never thought he should be all by himself in that wing in the first place._

So Dick had spent his first year at Wayne Manor sleeping in the old valet's room, next door to Bruce's. And if there were many nights when the nightmares had been especially bad, nights when Alfred had come to waken the young master for school and found him curled up in Bruce's bed, head enfolded by a heavy protective arm, sleeping sound and safe at last. . . well, sometimes sleeping with a sharp-boned creature who sprouted fourteen razor-keen elbows in his sleep was just what you did. 

_I'm afraid of the dark_ , Dick had whispered to him, one of those nights, in the voice of one steeling himself to the most shameful confession he could think of. _My cousin Simza used to say—_ But he had stopped, because Simza evidently led him to memories he did not want.

And Bruce hadn't offered comfort, hadn't said "don't be ridiculous, the dark is nothing to be afraid of." He had been quiet for so long Dick had probably thought him asleep. And then he said, _I can teach you how to be master of the dark. Do you want that?_

The master of the dark was currently drooling a bit into his pillow. 

Bruce bent to put a hand on his shoulder. If he was lucky, Dick would rouse to full consciousness before he got a knife in the belly, but it was always a near thing. Dick's eyes startled wide.

"Wake up," Bruce said. Dick raised his head.

"Clark—"

"He's fine. There's something I need you to do for me."

Dick pushed up to his elbows, clearly struggling to push aside sleep-fog. Bruce caught his quick sidelong glance at the empty bed next to him. Surely he didn't imagine Bruce was stupid. "Sure," said Dick, scrubbing a hand through his shock of hair. "What can I do?"

"I need you to be my best man."

Dick was all the way awake at that, and staring at Bruce like he was deciphering the answers he needed. Evidently he was, because he broke into a grin. "You're kidding me," he said. "You are goddamn kidding me."

"Nope. Now get up, you look like hell." Bruce prodded at him with his cane. "We've got maybe three hours to get this done. I've called in every favor I possibly can, and Judge Jimenez is going to be here before nine, with all the clerks and licensing we need. Get up, I need to go have breakfast. Bribing public officials is thirsty work."

Dick leaped up, before it occurred to him he was naked. He lunged for his pants before it occurred to him those were probably buried somewhere in the sheets, so Bruce watched with amusement as he settled for sitting back down and tugging the sheet around him. "You're serious," he said, his grin still firmly in place.

"How many times do you want me to say this? Come on, move your lazy ass, Batman."

That wiped the smile from Dick's face. "Don't," he said quietly. "I can take that from everybody else, but not from you. Don't you dare call me that."

Bruce didn't protest. Dick had finally secured something approximating clothing and was pulling himself up again. "You sure it's me you want," he said.

"Who else? Now get dressed."

"Okay," Dick said, with a critical glance at Bruce. "But what are you wearing?"

Bruce glanced at himself. "What, you don't approve?"

"Well. It's just that it's your wedding day. You don't think something a little more Caraceni might be in order?"

Bruce frowned. "The gray? You don't think that's too somber?"

"Maybe. But not with the right tie. Tell you what, I'll grab some toast and OJ, and meet you in your dressing room in five. I will not let you down here. What about rings?"

Bruce looked at him blankly. "I don't—"

"For God's sake, man. All right, I have a couple of ideas, we'll brainstorm over toast. I'm gonna stick my head under a faucet here, and then we'll be good to go. The lime Charvet tie, that's what I'm thinking. And who's that jeweler your dad always used, the Russian?"

"Zubin?"

"Him. Get him on the line, throw some of that bribery around, see what he can do for you. Be upstairs in three minutes!" And he raced toward the shower, most of his clothes—which were only debatably his in the first place—on backwards. Bruce made his way out of the cave (ascending stairs was about a thousand times easier than descending) and was past the monitors on his way to the elevator when he heard the soft whump of feet behind him. He paused, and the voice was at his shoulder.

"So it's true."

Bruce cocked a brow. "Hello, Jason."

"You can see again?"

"I can." 

Jason spun around to his front. Bruce let himself be studied, and just looked back. Whatever he had been expecting Jason to say, it wasn't what he did say, which was just: "Good. That's. . . good."

"It is."

"Dickie Bird says Clark traded himself for it. Bet you're pissed about that one. Nothing gets under your skin like owing something to someone."

"Maybe so," Bruce said mildly. 

"Clark, man. Kind of a badass motherfucker, when you think about it."

"I do think about it, and yes, he is." 

Jason was walking around him a little, like maybe if he looked at him from more angles he would have the answer. Bruce saw his eyes linger on the cane. "I didn't come see you," he said. 

"I know."

Jason made a shrugging gesture, like shaking something off his body. "Didn't really think I was someone you would want to see a whole lot of."

"How could you think that," he said roughly, but of course he knew exactly how Jason could think that, because it was what he himself would have thought. It was the leg Jason couldn't bear to see, and whatever Jason couldn't bear to see he ignored. 

"The trouble with you, Jason," he started, and then stopped. Jason had his arms crossed, waiting. Bruce shook his head. Not today, of all days. "Nothing," he said. "The trouble with you, is nothing."

Jason dropped his arms, but looked at him with suspicion. "Hey, one thing," he said. "I've been wondering. What you said down in those tunnels, about wanting me to off you. That was bullshit, right? You didn't actually want to die."

"No, I didn't actually want to die. But I was ready to. It would have bettered your chances of escape, so I was willing to pay that price. Everyone has a price. Mine was your life, and Dick's."

"Mm." Jason had his knife out, and was digging something out of one of his fingernails. "That's the thing about you, Bruce. You can say the noblest goddamn thing, and still manage to sound like such a cockhole doing it. You know that about yourself, right?"

"I do."

"Just checking." He holstered the knife. "See you around, then."

"Jason," he said into the dark. He couldn't see him, but he knew he had stopped. "Around nine this morning. If you'd like to come upstairs. . . I'd like to have you there."

He felt Jason weighing him. "Maybe so," he said. He evaporated into the dark, and Bruce stood there, listening to the sounds of his absence. It was a small beginning, maybe just another road to nowhere for the two of them, but today of all days, he would take it.


	4. Chapter 4

Clark stood unmoving in the Watchtower's cargo bay, and Bruce was silent beside him. Dick was on his other side. No one spoke, as the small silver New Genesian shuttlecraft settled to its docking station, and hovered a half-meter off the ground. 

He had not wanted anyone else around; there was no need to turn this into some big dramatic thing, some kind of show. He wore his costume, lest the Genesians think they weren't getting value for their money. It felt strange to be dressed like this next to Bruce in his simple gray suit and expensive tie. 

"Want me to fly back to Metropolis and get something nice?" he had said, when he had rolled over and seen Bruce wearing that exquisite suit. He had been wearing just normal clothes at the Watchtower yesterday, and hadn't exactly known when he got up yesterday morning that the next day would be—well. 

"Why? Your clothes are fine." Bruce was choosing cufflinks.

"Not next to that, they're not."

"Well, if it bothers you, we're roughly the same size, go pick something out."

"Seriously?" Clark yawned and stretched, trying to shake off the sleep that clung to him. He wanted nothing more than to curl in this bed, with Bruce next to him, for the next week. 

"Of course. Pick whatever you like."

"You're not going to get in the obligatory dig about my taste in clothes, about how flying back to Metropolis wouldn't help?"

Bruce looked up from his study of the cufflink tray. "You have excellent taste. Just not an excellent budget. Tell you what." He had evidently found a pair he liked: small lapis ovals rimmed in silver. He was on to the watch tray, frowning at his choices. "When you get back, I'll take you to Milan, and we'll get you fixed with some proper suits."

"Mm, yeah, that will go over great at the Planet. Least I'll look good at the symphony, though, with all the other trophy husbands." 

"Don't be ridiculous," Bruce said shortly. "The symphony is black tie."

"See? I'm a failure at this already." He folded his arms behind his head and grinned. Like it was any other morning, like waking up naked in Bruce's bed was something that happened to him every day. Like they could lie here and joke. The clock said eight. Four and a half more hours. 

Bruce was watching him closely. "Still want to go through with this?"

"Which this?"

"Either. Both. Any fool could say yes to one of them, but only a true idiot would say yes to both."

Clark stood in the cargo bay now, as stiff-backed as Bruce beside him. The unaccustomed weight on his left hand felt strange to him. That had been unlooked-for, when Bruce had shaken out the rings. It was clear he had almost forgotten about them, too, because Dick had had to say, _aren't you forgetting something_ , and Bruce had looked blank for a minute before Dick had rolled his eyes and gestured to his pocket. 

Bruce had shaken out two plain silver rings from the small crimson bag, into his palm. Or at least, he had thought they were plain, until he picked one of them up. And then he had looked at Bruce, and for the first time, in the whole strange, awkward, slightly embarrassing little ceremony, he had felt everything else fall away but Bruce's eyes. Bruce's eyes, anxious for his approval. He had seized Bruce's face in his hands and kissed him, until Dick cleared his throat with a mischievous gleam in his eyes. And then he had fumbled to put the ring on, and Bruce had had to say _I was really supposed to do that_ , and they had quickly exchanged them and put them on each other, and that was it, he was married. As married on Earth as on Krypton. Alfred had even whipped up a decent little cake on an hour's notice, and Clark had tried to smile and eat some. Two hours and twenty-five minutes. 

Clark clenched his hand behind his back as he stood in the cargo bay, watching the sleek little vessel's doors slide open, and he ran his thumb over the smooth silver band. He couldn't feel the inscription on the other side, but he knew it was there, next to his skin: _Enzakh ishtab_ , his said, and _iz kin lyagren_ , read Bruce's. "How the hell did you get this done," he had asked. The tiny Kryptonian script was perfectly etched, not a sigil out of place.

"Russian jewelers are perfectionists," Bruce said. "Besides, after decades of inscribing Cyrillic, Kryptonian's a walk in the park."

The only sour note had been discovering Bruce in the kitchen, locked in a furious cell phone conversation with someone. He had been trying to keep his voice low, but Clark could hear the fury pulsing in it. "That's just too damn bad," Bruce was saying. "But you need to remember that 'on retainer' means you're obligated to give me legal counsel, not that I'm obligated to take it." 

Clark had paused in the doorway, uncertain if he should back away. "The answer was no earlier this morning, and it's no now," Bruce said. "Too late means too late. And if you have an issue with my decision, then I need to look for another lawyer. Sorry," he said to Clark, after he had clicked off his phone. "Just business stuff."

"And I shouldn't worry my pretty little head about it?"

Bruce made a face. "It's just Wayne Foundation nonsense, about—"

"He's pissed you didn't use a pre-nup, huh."

"He'll get over it. To him, 'gay wedding' means I just married the cabana boy from Cap-du-Sol. Speaking of, we should plan our honeymoon. My feeling is, all that starving yourself you did to fit into the dress should be rewarded with a nice beach bikini."

Clark glanced at his watch. "Not sure I can fit it in, actually."

"When you get back, I mean." Bruce spoke as though he were taking a short weekend trip. "It will give you something to think about. I actually have an island I don't think I've ever mentioned. More of an atoll, really, but it's adequate. Or if you prefer the mountains, we could—"

"Bruce."

Bruce fell silent at that. "I need to start thinking about getting ready," Clark said. 

"Ten more minutes. Ten more minutes, not to think about it."

"All right, then." And Clark had looped his arms about him. They had folded into each other's arms in the perfect fit of two people more or less the same height and build. "Bruce," he whispered. "I can't stay. I need to get to Smallville. I have to let them know. I'll be back within the hour." 

"I know," Bruce said, and dropped his arms. Clark had never been so grateful for anything. 

"There are—look, there are only so many conversations I can have with them at a time," Clark said, and Bruce had put a hand on his arm.

"I know," he said again. "After you get back, we'll go see them together. For now, do what you need to do. I'll be here." 

It was the sum total of all their conversations, over the years. Do what you need to do: protect Metropolis, protect Gotham, protect the League, protect the Earth. And when he had finished, Bruce had always been here, as he had been for Bruce. Someone to argue with, someone to grieve with. The laughter had been more rare, but the more cherished because of it. 

Ambassador D'Neri was stepping onto the landing stage now, her arms folded into her vast sleeves, her face serene. Emenvor trailed after, looking a bit sullen. "Kal-El," she said solemnly. She bowed, as did he. Bruce didn't move. She waved a hand at Emenvor, and he came forward with a box. 

"When we met on New Genesis," she said, "you spoke of trust. I respected that, though I was skeptical. You spoke, too, of honor and of loyalty. Not in words, but in all your actions. Yesterday, I made a mistake. I assumed you would seize the first opportunity to go back on your word. I might have—should have—known better."

He inclined his head in acknowledgement of her words. Emenvor placed the box in his hands. She turned and addressed Bruce, now, for the first time. "In this box is the nanotechnology required to repair your injury," she said, nodding at his leg. "Kal-El negotiated for this, as well. Our agreement stipulated that this should be handed over after half Kal-El's time among us had elapsed. Today I am voiding that stipulation, and saying it shall be yours now—as a token of faith and good-will, and as a gesture of respect for Kal-El."

He saw Bruce's hands close on the small cask, and he saw in those careful movements Bruce's rage. He had agreed not to lie anymore, but this had not been so much a lie as an omission. And now Bruce would know the full truth—that he would be gone for two full years because he had agreed to double the length of time he gave the New Genesians, for this. Well, he had experienced Bruce's anger before. He could weather this too. 

"Are you ready to depart?" Ambassador D'Neri spoke politely. "If you would prefer a few more minutes—"

"No," he said. "I'm ready. Thank you for your gestures of respect, Ambassador. Know that they are returned by me and by all the people of Earth."

She glanced at Bruce with the smallest hint of ironic smile, as though perfectly aware who was not included in that. She pressed her palms together and bowed her head, then extended her arm to usher him into the ship. Clark stepped firmly onto the landing platform as it was raised. He did nothing but look at Bruce. Bruce had handed the box off to Dick, and was looking only at him. Their eyes were locked and steady, their faces calm.

All good-byes had been said earlier, in the Javelin. Clark was piloting, Bruce's eyes absent and out the window. They spoke little. "You sure you want me along?" Dick had asked earlier, and Clark had said, in a voice meant only for him, "I'm sure. You make sure he doesn't fly back alone, all right?"

"Got it," Dick said, with a squeeze of his arm. "And Clark?"

"Yeah."

"You and I—" Dick had wiped a hand across his forehead. "Jesus, I don't even know what to say. Thank you comes to mind. For when I was a kid, for now, for everything in between. For what you're doing for him. I realize he just wants to kick your ass right now, but I figure you should hear thank you, from someone at least.

"I don't need thanks," Clark said. "I did lie to him pretty good."

"Yeah. I get that. But I just wanted to say, you know, that if it weren't for what we're about to do—for you leaving, I mean—this would be pretty much the happiest day of my life. Seeing the two of you, like this, I mean. Kind of a childhood dream come true, for me."

Clark had looked at him in some astonishment. "Really? You mean that?"

"Oh yeah. Not that I ever believed it would actually happen. Jason used to say—" He looked quickly away. "Anyway. Congratulations, is what I meant to say. And welcome to the world's most fucked-up family. Which I guess you already pretty much were a part of, so you already know that. But now you get the membership card and full gym access." 

Bruce had laughed when Clark had repeated it to him. They were at the Javelin's controls, waiting while Dick checked the rear dampeners before they set out for their rendezvous at the Watchtower. "One more thing," Bruce had said. Clark had been checking the sensors, and startled at Bruce's hand on his shoulder. Bruce spun his chair and lifted him out of it. He fisted his shirt, right above the shield, and pulled his face in. "You goddamn come back to me," Bruce said. "Do you understand me?"

Clark kept his voice steady. "Always."

Bruce crushed their mouths together, and for just a minute Clark let himself sink into it, imagining they had nothing better to do but go back to the Manor and lie in that beautiful wide bed and maybe worry about what they should tell Alfred to do for dinner. And then they were done, and Dick was walking back up the ramp, and everything had been said. 

Standing at the landing platform of the New Genesian ship, watching Bruce disappear behind the slowly sliding doors, Clark said the conversation over again with his eyes, and Bruce said it back. There wasn't anything else in the bay that mattered but Bruce's eyes. 

At the last moment, when all but the narrowest sliver of Bruce's face had been eclipsed from view, something shockingly cold hit his neck. His knees crumpled, and at first all he could feel was puzzlement—until the bite he knew too well dug its fingers under his flesh, squeezing his chest. He cried out, and his hands flew to his neck, because some mistake—this couldn't be happening, it wasn't possible—

"NOOOO!" 

He knew the howl of rage was Bruce's, he could see the fury and horror contorting Bruce's face, and a long spear was hurled at the closing doors, jamming them—Bruce's cane, expertly aimed, but D'Neri was shouting something at Emenvor, and Clark had no voice, the kryptonite was powerful, he tried to shout a warning but it was barely a whisper. Emenvor's shot was true, and Bruce dropped like a stone, and Dick was yelling, firing batarangs, and the cargo bay klaxons were sounding, but there was only the pain that ate through his body from his neck with slow hungry bites. Clark's head followed his knees to the floor, and he was vomiting. _Too strong_ , he thought. _It must have been a long time since they've used this on any Kryptonian, they're using too much, I'll be dead before we reach New Genesis_. And then he remembered the sight of Bruce's body falling, and was glad the end was soon. 

He roused when a small booted foot planted itself on his ribcage. He squinted up through a fog of pain to see Ambassador D'Neri's face. _Help me_ , he wanted to say, but her face was a chill mask of contempt. 

"Today begins my world's rebirth," she said. "And today." Her hand reached to the thing on his neck, turning something on it. "Today is the day you learn your true place in this universe. . . _Kryptonian_." She spat it like an obscenity.

The pain surged under him like a cliff wall, and he tumbled down it, headfirst.

* * *

It took him maybe four seconds to place himself, when he woke. He was up and across the room in five. "Get Lantern," he barked. "What the hell—" There was a needle in him, and he yanked it out. "Why is—"

"Bruce, you need to lie down—Christ, _Leslie_ —" Dick was shouting, and Dick's arms were trying to pin him, but a quick downward thrust broke that hold. 

"Get Lantern, goddammit! Where the hell is—" And then he stopped, because he realized he was standing.

Really standing, weight on both his legs.

He had leaped across the room. 

That was his IV he had just ripped out. 

"Look," said Dick grimly, and Bruce landed the full force of his fist in his jaw. Dick staggered back. Anyone else he would have felled.

"You son of a bitch," Bruce panted. "You son of a goddamn _bitch_."

"What the fuck," Dick managed, when he had his breath back. He was cradling his jaw.

"You fixed my leg. You gave Leslie the tech. You let her use that on me. You saw what they did to Clark, and you let her use it."

"You were already under," Dick said, gritting his teeth. "Leslie was already stitching you back together from that phaser slice across your middle — the stitches I'm sure you just ripped out. What the hell was I supposed to do? And what do you mean, what they did to Clark? Clark did it to himself, this was Clark's agreement, this was what he wanted."

Bruce stood stunned. "How can you say that? You saw what they were doing, you were there, you saw—"

"Bruce." Dick was shaking his head. "What I saw was, you attacked the New Genesian ship. You attacked them, and of course they opened fire, and you're damn lucky that shot caught you where it did and not an inch and a half higher. Now will you please get back in bed, you're probably bleeding internally now. For Christ's sake, can you for _once_ stay in a hospital bed."

Bruce clutched at the counter. "Listen to me," he gasped, because yes, Dick's estimate of internal bleeding was probably not wrong. "I attacked because I saw them snap a—thing—on Clark's neck and I saw them activate it. My guess is, kryptonite. You have to—get to the cave—their access to kryptonite—if you can research—"

Dick's arms were supporting him. Bruce threw them off. "No. No. Dick, listen to me. If you've ever trusted me, trust me now. Clark is in danger—" _dead dead dead_ said his brain, but he pushed it down. "We have to get—the Lantern Corps can—should talk to Hal—" The floor rushed up at him. 

Dick was hoisting him back to the bed. His arm was red from the IV he had pulled out. He felt like there was a knife sticking out his gut. He gripped Dick's arm until he was sure he was causing pain. "Please," he managed. "Trust me."

Dick was laying him back on the bed. "Okay," he said somberly. "You say trust you, and I do. You say you saw something, that's what you saw. I can get Hal to communicate with the Green Lantern Corps, and they can check on Clark in New Genesis, make sure everything's okay. But you stay here, all right? Please just give your body twenty-four hours to recover. If something is wrong, if Clark is in danger, then you have to have your full strength back. You won't be able to help him otherwise. Let me do this part, okay?"

Leslie was there, her face swimming above him. "Finished," she was muttering. "Absolutely done with you, Bruce Wayne. I swear to God, you've ripped out more IVs than I've installed in my entire lifetime." The jab of the needle in his arm was not at all gentle. 

"Stop—drugging me," he protested, but Clark leaned over the bed and frowned at him. "Bruce. You need to listen to her, now. Alfred's not going to be very happy with you."

"Sorry," he said. "Clark. Don't go. I hit Dick."

"He'll be fine. He forgave you when you killed his family."

"I—didn't. . ." _Did he?_ "The Talons weren't. . . family. He wasn't. . ."

"But you're not his real father. A real father wouldn't have hit him. He knows that."

"Am. . . real father. He said. . . I didn't mean to. . ."

Clark's face became Dick's. Had it been him all along? Would Dick have said those things? "Shhh," Dick was saying. "Here is where you trust me, too. Relax. I'll take care of things. Clark called, and said you shouldn't talk to him again. He said he could never love someone who abandoned him like that."

"Okay," Bruce said, rolling over, doubled in pain. "That. . . seems right."

* * *

The conference hall was painfully quiet. 

"We've reviewed the security footage from every angle," J'onn said, in his measured voice. "In none of them is it possible to see the event you are describing."

"You doubt my word," Bruce said. He was not sitting at the table, but facing the window. 

"Nobody doubts your word," Diana said heatedly. "J'onn's point is just that it's going to be very difficult to accuse the New Genesians of any wrongdoing we can't prove." 

"You can prove it, because you have an eyewitness." Bruce didn't turn around. 

"Batman," said Hal, and he and Dick both turned. Bruce clenched his jaw and turned back to the window. "You were there. What did you see?" 

There was a pause. "I can't be sure," Dick said. He sat cowled, at the head of the table, and so far he had said nothing. Bruce had taught him that when he was thirteen: _If you want a room's ears, wait until everyone is wondering why you haven't spoken_. "I wasn't standing where Bruce was standing. I wouldn't have been able to see what he saw. But I can tell you this, that if Bruce saw Clark being mistreated, that is what happened, and we should act accordingly. The League has relied for too many years on his judgment to have reason to doubt it now."

"Is no one going to say the obvious thing here?" Shayera was looking around at the table in wonder. "Less than twenty-four hours after surgery on his eyes, in a surgical procedure with technology we don't fully understand, and we're talking about an act of war on a peaceful planet based on. . . something he _saw?_ For all we know his vision has been compromised, or his brain."

" _He_ is right here," Bruce pointed out. "And _his_ brain is fine. Dr. Thompkins can give you every medical assurance you require that I'm not hallucinating."

Next to Hal, John Stewart shifted, looking uncomfortable. "I don't think Hawkgirl was suggesting—"

"Yes I was." 

"Hey, come on," Barry interjected. "If there's even a chance that these people are holding Supes against his will, don't we want to go in there guns blazing? Figuratively speaking, I mean," he said with a glance at Bruce.

"I'm fine with the non-figurative," he replied.

"Look, no one's saying don't take action if something's wrong," Hal said, exasperatedly. "But for Superman's sake, we can't just barrel in like space cowboys. He worked hard for this deal, to establish these ties with the New Genesians—I was there, I can tell you what that was like. I'm not going to watch us destroy everything he worked for out of—" he glanced at Bruce. "Guilt, or something like that. I never agreed with what he was doing, but he wouldn't thank me for destroying it."

"You think I'm asking for some invasion force?" Bruce asked. "I know as well as you do what our capabilities are, compared with New Genesis. If the League won't demand an explanation, then I'm asking for the Green Lanterns to make an appearance. There's no reason the Corps can't make a stop on New Genesis and find out what the hell's going on, speak to Clark."

"There is, actually, " John pointed out. "A very good one. No one on New Genesis has ever invited the Corps' presence. You know as well as I do that the Corps won't operate on a planet that hasn't made a formal invitation."

"For God's sake," Bruce ground out. "Then Hal, you go, without the Corps. You were there for negotiations with Clark, that's enough of an invitation. You have a reason to be there. You can go without violating anything. Or John can go, whichever. But he won't, because he thinks I'm hallucinating, and he thinks that because that's what his girlfriend thinks."

"Bruce," said Diana.

"Oh no, I'm glad you brought that up," Shayera said. "I think we should talk about people letting their personal attachments cloud their judgment." 

"Enough," barked Dick. 

"The League chose you as leader because we trusted you to speak for all of us," she continued, turning to Dick. "But so far I just hear you speaking for Bruce Wayne. And I'm sorry, I thought this room was for members only, not former members. Or does the influence of Wayne money reach here too?"

"So help me, I'm going to take that mace and shove it where—" Diana was half out of her seat when Dick's voice quelled the room. " _Hawkgirl_." It was Batman's voice, and they both stilled. 

"I said, enough. If you have a problem with me as your leader, then bring a new vote. In the meantime, you'll do as I say, or you're the one whose presence in this room will face a vote, is that understood?" He rose, and the cape swirled around him. That was a little trick with the wrist Dick had picked up watching him. "The League is going to contact New Genesis and ask to speak to Superman. One of the Green Lanterns is going to fly there and make contact with the Ambassador. Whatever explanation exists for what happened in the cargo bay, we will have it in the next twenty-four hours."

They filed out, and Bruce kept his back to the room until they were all gone. "Sorry about that," Dick said quietly, after the room was theirs again. 

"What for? Shayera's right, you ought to be questioning my judgment."

"Pretty sure I've been doing that most of my life. A nine-thirty curfew, for a fifteen year old? Still carrying that around." Dick stripped off the gauntlets, tossed them on the polished table with a heavy thud, then pulled off the cowl. "Look," he said. "You need to know, I'm done."

"I know."

"I tried. I did what you wanted me to do. But this is not me."

"I know."

"I know I'm disappointing you, I know I'm turning my back on everything you've wanted for me since I was nine, but I'm telling you, I am not Batman, and I'm not going to spend the rest of my life playing a part. I understand why you wanted what you did, why you wanted to create a symbol that was larger than any one man. But you overlooked something. Thing is, Bruce, there isn't much larger than you. You _are_ Batman. I know you never intended it to turn out that way, but everything Batman is and does, that's all an extension of _your_ personality, it's all part of _you_. No one else can ever step into that, no one else can ever become—"

"I said I know. Do you still listen like a fifteen-year-old, too?"

Dick snorted. "Put the goddamn suit on."

Bruce turned back to the window and studied the landscape of stars. Such impossible beauty, in this view that so few ever got to see, and at such terrible cost. "We'll see," he said.

* * *

It was no surprise to Bruce that New Genesis had its planetary shields in place. He stood on the bridge of the Watchtower watching J'onn's attempts to raise a response. The League had no long-range sensors that could give them a visual that far into the Lambda Sector, and the truth was, what communication frequencies they could manage were unreliable anyway. But there was a difference between unreliable and impenetrable. 

"Any word from Lantern?" He flexed his hands in the gauntlets. He kept his feet planted wide, in order not to pace. Hal stood too close, watching him. 

"The Javelin's communicators should be within range in two Earth hours," J'onn said. To the degree that anything could ever be known from J'onn's voice, Bruce could tell he was not optimistic. 

Diana stood beside him. "Is there any reason those shields would be up that isn't bad news?"

"Their nearest neighbor is Apokolips," Barry pointed out. "That's bad news enough. No wonder they have shielding technology in place."

"But engaging shielding technology without leaving a communications gap is unusual." J'onn was typing further, trying different frequencies, his fingers moving so fast Bruce had the impression those long appendages were bleeding into the touchpads, reaching out through space.

Bruce crossed his arms, watching the expanse of nothing on the screen. The black body armor encasing him felt like being back behind fortress walls, and he had never been so grateful for the expressionless mask of his cowl. "If those shields are as strong as I think they are," he said, "we have no hope of landing a team on the surface, boom tube or no boom tube. We'll be lucky if they don't blow John out of the sky."

"They wouldn't dare," Diana scoffed. "An act of aggression against a member of the Lantern Corps? Oa would launch an attack immediately."

"Which is the only thing keeping him safe at the moment," Bruce said. He saw the twitch in Shayera's left wing-tip as he said it. He was enough of a sadist not to regret the remark. Let her know what it felt like. _Personal attachments_ , she had said.

He could hear Clark's voice now: _Every time I think you might have a little humanity in you._

 _Don't make that mistake_ , he had replied. 

_Which one would that be?_

_Thinking we're friends._

Clark's laugh. _The trouble with you, Bruce, is you could never forgive anyone who wanted to be your friend. But don't worry, I have too much self-respect for that gig._

Clark's face, intent above his, pumping water out of his chest. Hands knitted together, pressing into his ribcage. _One—two—three—four—five—BREATHE damn you. It's not ending here, I won't let it._ The reeking vomit of stale water, the relief on Clark's face. _I thought I had lost you. Don't you dare do that to me again._ His hand reaching for Clark's, the way the firm grip met his. 

Once, years later, he had asked: _Is that the word for it then? Friends?_

And Clark's shadowed face, something nameless flitting across it, and as quickly gone: _Sure. The best of them_. 

If he had had the courage then, instead of waiting until the last possible moment, they might have had more time. But his own cowardice and fear had kept him as imprisoned as his armor. And now it was too late.

"We will find him," Diana said, quietly. Her hand brushed the spike of his gauntlet, and he shook it off.

"No," he said. "We won't." 

And he turned, letting the heavy black cloak snap after him. It should have felt good, to be Batman again. It should have felt incredible, like being back in his own skin again. Some part of him should have been able to enjoy it. It should have at least felt like something, instead of this flat nothingness. Had there only ever been one person, then, he had been trying to impress all these years? How long had that been the case? 

How long had there been only one person he was Batman _for?_

The hollow in his chest matched the hard thud of his boots on the metal floor.


	5. Chapter 5

Five days at this market, and a handful of filthy korrvangs to show for it. Davnar spat into the dust and stretched his face into another smile as a passing group of shoppers strolled by. They ignored him as they chattered and laughed, and he let his face relax into a snarl. 

"Gentlemen," he tried, aiming an oily smile and nod at two passing businessmen. They paused for a second at the cage with the children, considering the meatiest one. Davnar circled and approached. 

"If that is the one you fancy, I would be willing to consider a favorable deal that included one of the others," he said. "Perhaps not the blond, but the darker one, she is stronger than she looks. Shall I take one of them out for you to—"

They waved him off and proceeded on their way, still earnestly talking to each other, no time to spare for such as Davnar. Fruitsellers and fishmongers got the time of day, but not slavers. It was enough to drive a decent man to drink, but a living had to be made. "Goatfucking Trallians," he muttered, wiping his mouth with a handkerchief. He reached for a flask to cool his thirst, and stopped with it halfway to his lips. Across the market, a tall auburn-haired woman with her attendant was sampling the wares at the fabric stall—the sort of woman the dust of this place didn't cling to, and clearly of senatorial class.

She was fingering the silks with a small frown, and now she was. . . yes, she was, she was walking this way. Davnar pasted on his most winning smile. "My lady," he said. 

In the way of such folk, she did not acknowledge his greeting. She was peering at the cage of children, no longer frowning. He sidled next to her. "They are remarkable specimens, are they not? So sweet-tempered, so docile and—" one of them bit his foot through a gap in the cage, and he kicked at it. Someone would do without dinner tonight. "And _tractable_ ," he said, with another discreet kick. 

The woman sniffed. "I have no interest in children," she said. "And were I in the market to buy, I wouldn't take such ill-nourished things. Look, that one is clearly dehydrated."

With a smile that edged into a snarl, Davnar nudged a dish of water into the pen. The children crowded round it. The woman had moved on to another cage—no, she was drifting away. He fought the rising panic of losing his last possible sale of the day. "My lady," he began again. "I do have other wares than children, if you'd care to take a look. I don't leave them out in the heat of the day—they are not for the common folk, if you take my meaning. Perhaps you would care to take a glance inside my tent?"

She turned an inscrutable gaze on him. The attendant had already moved on to the next stall, and Davnar felt the tang of desperation in his mouth. Her eyes were moving on, following her sleek-haired attendant whose robes probably cost more than Davnar's whole house. " _Inside_ the tent," he said, significantly. "I have. . . an item of interest."

"No, thank you," she said.

"My lady. This item. . . is not for all eyes. The authorities on this world would be _most interested_ , were they to see it."

Her kohl-lined eyes narrowed at him. "My husband sits on the board of trade lictors," she said, and for a heart-stopping moment Davnar saw himself, rotting in a Trallian jail. 

"I—that is—I did not—"

"And he is a man of very. . . _exotic_ taste," she said, a slow smile twitching the corner of her mouth. "He is fond of acquiring what others cannot. I think I will take a look inside your tent after all, if you are indeed not a liar like all slavers."

Sunlight burst in his heart, and he tried to keep his own grin under control. "Right this way, madam," he said, peeling back the heavy tent curtain. She snapped her manicured finger for her attendant, who filed in behind them. Davnar secured the flap. He had the satisfaction of hearing her intake of breath.

"It cannot be," she said. 

"But it can," he said. "On your feet." He yanked on the chain, and his prize holding slowly got to his feet. The only light was the skyhole in the tent, but it poured bright sun. It was enough to see what he had. 

"You have a Kryptonian," she said. 

"And you have a good eye. I did not want to sell, when he came into my possession. But for the right price—for, say, ten thousand korrvangs—I could be persuaded to part with my beauty."

"That he is," she said, cocking a critical head at him. "Though you've fed him none too well."

"But I have," he protested, "I have indeed. In truth I have fattened him up, nursed him to health, loved him like my own." The Kryptonian gave him a bitter glance at that, which Davnar ignored. It was disconcerting, how many languages the slave seemed able to pick up. 

But the woman was looking suspicious. "A small-time slave-dealer on an obscure world like this one," she said. "What would the likes of you be doing with a Kryptonian? And you can drop your ridiculous charade about ten thousand korrvangs. It's illegal to own one of these, and unloading one is as dangerous as keeping it. You'll be lucky to fetch fine hundred, and I will perhaps pay you half that and do you the courtesy of forgetting I ever saw this."

"My lady," he choked, but she silenced him with an upraised hand. The filthy bitch. He ought to stab her, ought to snap a collar on her and throw her in a cage to trade the next galaxy over. He would, too, if it weren't for that attendant of hers, who was looking at Davnar with steady eyes. He caught the flex of muscle under that expensive robe. Probably she was screwing him; all those rich cunts did it, with their bodyguards, and this bodyguard was too good-looking by half.

"Where is his collar," she said, in sudden alarm. "You don't have an uncollared Kryptonian in here. By the gods, you idiot, you will kill us all! This is a yellow sun planet, what on earth were you thinking not to—"

"No no, my lady, it is not of concern. He is. . . he is no threat to you, I promise."

She was edging nearer now, standing close enough to look the Kryptonian in the eye. Davnar stepped forward and grabbed a flail, which he smashed into the slave's head. "Avert your gaze," he hissed, because this one would never learn, would never keep his eyes down like a proper slave. He raised the flail again, but the attendant had gripped his wrist. 

"I wouldn't do that," he growled, and Davnar almost dropped the flail in shock. The woman snatched it from him and lashed it against her attendant's neck, hard.

"Forgive me," she said to Davnar. "Now you see why I am interested in a new slave. This one is a recent acquisition, and still struggling to understand his place."

The attendant receded into the background, his jaw tight, the angry red mark on his neck standing out. She tossed the flail back to Davnar. "Go on," she said. "I'm fascinated to hear why you think an unleashed Kryptonian is no threat. You are either mad or a liar, and this is no Kryptonian at all."

Davnar glanced again at the attendant. "I assure you madam, this is a full-blooded Kryptonian—the rarest of the rare. However, I will be frank. He is of. . . diminished capacity."

"How do you mean, is he feeble-minded?" She was squinting into his face now, as if that would give her the answer. The Kryptonian was gazing steadily at the back of the tent, that faraway look in his eyes, the one that made Davnar want to start another round of beatings. 

"Not in mind, no. But for a Kryptonian. . . well, I will be as honest as I can possibly be with you, because I see that you appreciate the rarity and value of this piece. The truth is, he was held for a period of time on New Genesis, and they. . . did not understand how one deals with a Kryptonian."

"No?" She was walking around, viewing her potential acquisition from all angles now. 

"I am afraid not. The truth of the matter is, they used too much kryptonite on him. He can't absorb any radiation at all any more, because those idiots on New Genesis botched the whole thing. If they had asked me, or any competent slave dealer—but you know New Genesians."

"Yes, I do," she murmured. "What fools." She turned back to Davnar. "So what you are telling me is, this one is dying of kryptonite poisoning, so you bought it for a handful of coins, and you are hoping to offload it for what profit you can before it dies and you are left with the difficulty of disposing of an illegally acquired body, yes?"

"Dying!" he protested. "No my lady, I assure you he is not. He may have no extraordinary strength left, but he is still an astonishing specimen. There is his beauty, for one thing—surely you remarked the true Kryptonian blue in his eyes? And his form—why, with proper exercise and care, better even than I have been able to give him with my meager resources, he will look like a god among men."

"Some god," she sighed, coming back around to regard him from the front. "So what you are saying is, he's a lovely vase to stand around and ornament my dinner parties, but not much use besides."

He glanced at the attendant, but after his brief insubordination he was sulking in sullen retreat by the door. "My lady," Davnar said, lowering his voice. "Kryptonians are far more than just decorative. They make excellent household managers, being intellectually gifted, and can often be trusted to manage accounts, teach little ones, even compose poetry and music, some of them. And then they are endowed with. . . other gifts as well."

He twitched at the loin cloth covering the Kryptonian's groin, and pulled it off. The slave gave no reaction other than a slight tightening of his jaw, and a steadier gaze into the distance. "Quite the cock, is it not?" Davnar murmured. "Have you ever seen its like?"

She was regarding it critically. "Once or twice," she said. "Though impressive, I'll grant you. Can it do anything?"

"You would not credit it," Davnar said, his naughty smile deepening. "As I said, I have been caring for him, and I've become quite fond of. . . sampling the wares on this one, shall we say. I can assure you his performance will not disappoint."

The woman was looking at him strangely, but then she looked quickly away and back to the Kryptonian. She was fingering the chain at his neck, running an idle hand down his bare chest. Oh yes; this one was swallowing the bait all right. Even if she did pay him just two hundred fifty korrvangs, that would more than make his time here on Trallia worth it. Now she had hooked a finger in the chain and yanked downward, and the Kryptonian was on his knees with a small grunt. She was clearly a creature of surprising strength.

"Show me his teeth," she said, and Davnar stepped forward to pry open the jaw and display the perfect undamaged rows of teeth within. She was running a hand through the hair, testing its thickness and resilience. She wiped her hand on her mantle with distaste.

"Next time try actual soap," she said, "not this sickening oil. All you slavers use it, as though we are going to believe your wares have bathed in rose petals before you trot them out. Ugh. The perfumes of the slave market, as nauseating as your deceptions. All right," she said, clicking her fingers at her attendant, who stepped forward with her coin purse. "I will pay you a hundred korrvangs for your trouble."

"But—my lady, for a mere hundred I cannot—"

"A hundred, and with every protest I lower it by twenty korrvangs. You take my price, or I report you to the council of lictors. Do we have a deal?"

"My lady. . . I beg you. . . you cannot so rob me of my property, of my prized inventory, of my—"

"Not so prized as all that," she said, "judging by the fresh stripe marks on his back. He was beaten to the blood just yesterday, I'd say. And you've already been using his body for your own enjoyment, so why should I pay more for a battered and used slave, even if it is a Kryptonian? So shut your oily mouth or I will have my manservant shut it for you."

The attendant took the coins and flung them on the floor. Davnar was so choked with rage he could barely speak; his blood was pounding in his ears, his chest. This could not be happening. His long knife was just behind that curtain—if he could but reach it. . . 

"Try it and die," the woman said, right in his ear. Her grip on his wrist was so painful, so blindingly strong, that he cried out. How could such a thing be? How could—

"Struggle just once more," she said softly, "and I will take that knife and gut you. You have no idea how much it would please me. For now I will satisfy myself with this," and with a crunching sound she snapped a bone in his wrist. Davnar's world whited out with pain, and he opened his mouth to scream but found a rag tied around his mouth. The attendant was yanking him to his feet and—no, how dare he, what was happening? He was being shackled, chained like an animal, and they were releasing the Kryptonian, who just kept staring dully ahead like none of it was happening, the stupid beast.

"You bitch," Davnar spat, when he tore his mouth free for a moment, but then there was a knee in his groin and the gag was back on his mouth. The attendant—insolent wretch, he would be hanged for this—was gripping his throat, his face an angry snarl.

"You like rape?" he said. "That something you like? How would you like it if I squeezed your throat, just like this? How about if I—"

" _Enough_ ," the woman said sharply. "Leave him." She had bent to pick up the hobnailed flail on the floor of the tent, and was examining it. 

"Going to take another swing at me?" her attendant asked, and this was wrong, everything about this was wrong, Davnar was starting to think they were both runaway slaves masquerading as buyers, he had heard of gangs like that, he was going to end up gutted, his intestines spilling on the floor, and he writhed and screamed behind his gag.

"Quiet," the woman said, and the flail thunked against the back of his head, and the world went black.

* * *

Clark watched them carefully, keeping himself as still as possible. As soon as Davnar was unconscious, he sensed his chance, and shifted slightly out of the light. The key to the chain was just out of his reach, behind that partition, but if he could use a portion of the tentpole. . . 

"Kal-El of Krypton," the woman said, turning to him. He froze. "And Clark Kent of Earth. We are your friends, and we are here to help. But for the next few minutes, you need to trust us."

The man was plucking cloaks from the pegs, trying to find one that would fit him. He tossed it at him, and Clark caught it. The woman had the key to the chain. "I'm going to release you," she said. "But I'm going to need to leave your hands and neck bound. I'm sorry, but it's necessary, while we escape."

He said nothing. "You don't trust us," she said, "and no more you should. But at the very least, we've got to be better than a slave-trader. So why don't you come with us and then decide?"

"Running out of time," the man said. He was peering out the tent flap, and he was right—the market would be closing down now, as the late afternoon shadows were lengthening. It would look suspicious, the longer Davnar wasn't out there, shutting down his shop, closing for the night. 

So he took a chance, because he could think of no reason not to. He did nothing while she released him from the peg his chains were secured to, though it would have been an easy matter to wrap the chain around her neck and choke her out, then make his own escape. Well, possibly not so easy with her companion around, but he could probably improvise. He wasn't as weak as he had let Davnar think he was, though he knew things were bad enough. 

"Come," she said. "I will need to hold your chain. Can you move quickly?"

He nodded. At the doorway of the tent, he balked. "We need to move," the man hissed. Clark shook his head. 

"We weren't going to forget about them," she said. "You need to trust us." She took her purse from the man and slipped out the tentflap. She crouched at the cage of the four children, who glanced up at Clark with wary eyes. 

"I mean you no harm," she said. "We're going to release you. We have money you can use for your journey. If you—"

"They don't. . . speak Trallian," Clark said, and he was almost startled at the hoarseness of his own voice. It had been so long since he had spoken; he had stopped keeping track of time, but it was months, maybe longer. The woman looked at him in silence, another strange expression on her face. Clark knelt beside the cage, and the man quickly moved to block him from the view of others in the market, so it was less obvious what was happening.

"Don't be frightened," Clark said in the Firikan dialect most of them seemed to use. He had never spoken any, but he had listened to their chatter for months now, and it was easy enough to pick up. 

"These people are going to help you. They're friends." Not strictly true, and of course the likelihood was that they were very much not. But this was not the moment for complexity. "I'm going to open the cage," he said, "but you can't all rush out, or people will notice. You should leave one at a time. Go inside the tent. There is money in there, and clothes to wear. Take what you need and head to the docks as soon as it is full dark. Miraba," he said, turning to the oldest girl. "Can you be brave?"

She nodded, her eyes large. "You will be their leader. Will you all agree to follow Miraba, and do what she tells you?"

A chorus of mute assent. He unclipped the bar on the cage and stood aside. "Remember, one at a time. Hide in the tent till dark, then move to the docks, where you can find passage home. Keep the money safe."

"Davnar," Miraba whispered. "He's in there."

"He's unconscious. He's also tied up. He can't hurt you. I promise. Now fly free, little ones."

The fruitseller across the way was becoming interested in the goings-on at Davnar's tent, and Clark quickly moved behind the woman and man. "Let's go, let's go," the man muttered, and they began to pick their way through the marketplace. The woman held his chain securely in her hand. They moved at a sedate, untroubled pace, and were soon beyond the outskirts of the market, which was on the edge of town. They were headed off into the sand dunes of the surrounding desert.

The woman did not offer to release his chain, and he did not ask. He wasn't sure he could, actually; with every step he felt himself getting weaker in a way that was not familiar. It wasn't kryptonite, whose sharp bite he knew in its every possible nuance. It was something else, something that was making his gorge rise in nausea and the ground swim under his feet. He moved steadily on, trying to mask his weaving. If the woman noticed, she said nothing. 

They halted near sunset, at a large rock formation. A wave of nausea hit Clark so intense it knocked him to his knees, and he retched bile into the sand. " _Now_ ," the woman said, holding a finger to her ear, and something was happening—the rock shifted somehow, slid, opened like a door, and he caught a glimpse of a shining, gleaming interior. It wasn't rock at all, but something else. But how. . .

There were arms lifting him up, a blanket being wrapped around him. He had forgotten he was naked. He no longer noticed things like naked; the blanket felt strange. There were more people, they were talking to him, but he couldn't make out the voices. . . everything was shimmering somehow, and he tried to stop retching but couldn't, couldn't even stand upright. . .

"It's the magic," the woman said, and there was something in her voice. . . had he heard it somewhere before? Some quality he couldn't put his finger on. "He can't stand much more of it, it could be killing him. Zatanna, _now_."

"Oh hell to the _no_ ," called the man, and now he had seated himself at the. . . cockpit? Was this a ship of some sort? "We're not lifting this spell until we're out of Trallian airspace, are you kidding me? We don't have the kind of firepower to evade their border patrol, and we sure as hell don't have authorization to be flying unknown craft into—okay, hang on, this is gonna be a bumpy take-off."

Clark was knocked to the floor by the cabin's roll, or maybe by something else. It was getting hard to breathe, and objects were swimming in and out of focus. The woman's arms were around him, trying to hold him up. He tried to shrug her off, but she was too strong for him. D'Neri. . . it had to be D'Neri come back for him, she was hunting him throughout the galaxy, he would never be free of her. . .

"No," he said weakly, trying to pry her claws off him. "Can't. . . no, stop. . ."

"Zatanna," the woman said. "Can you lift it just in the cabin? We have to do something, he can't stand much more of this, do it _now_." There was something like panic in her voice, and her arms on him tightened. Couldn't be D'Neri. So like someone else, but who? What had there been before D'Neri?

" _Evomer siht ruomalg!_ " another woman's voice shouted, over the roar of the ship's thrusters. There was more of the strange shimmering, but all around him now, and faces shifted, resolved into something entirely other—at the cockpit, the woman's attendant became a handsome man with a shock of chestnut hair, someone terribly familiar, who kept casting anxious glances back at him, and as for the woman. . .

Long auburn hair receded into a dark mop, her delicate features thickened and lengthened—her brow became heavier, her lips thinner, her. . .

"Bruce?" he said. A name from another lifetime, a name he didn't know he still knew, but it came to him from some forgotten corner of self. 

"Right here," she said, only it was a _he_ , and that voice was unmistakable. But Bruce wore his hair shorter than the slightly shaggy fringes around this man's face, and his face wasn't quite so angular and thin. There were crow's-feet at the corners of his eyes, lines where he hadn't expected there to be.

"You've _aged_ ," Clark said, blinking up at him.

"You're too kind." 

"Z, talk to me," the man said from the cockpit, and Hal, that was his name, that was who it was. "I'm getting bogeys closing on my position, can they detect me?"

"It shouldn't be possible, I kept the glamour around the ship when I lifted it inside—unless I was mistaken somehow, and didn't compensate for—"

"Yeah, we're gonna go with _mistaken somehow_ ," he called, and the Javelin—how did he know it was called that?—gave a violent evasive lurch. He could hear the whine of missiles outside. "I need a gunner, somebody climb in the hole!"

"On it," shouted a blond man Clark hadn't noticed before, unbuckling himself and heading to the— _Oliver_ , that was his name, how did he remember that too?

"Belay that, get me Bruce!" Hal shouted back.

"I'm a trained marksman!"

"Excellent, you get a fucking gold star, can we argue about it _after_ we live through this? _Shit!_ " The Javelin gave another lurch and roll. " _Bruce_ , get in the fucking hole!"

"Sorry, have to go," Bruce said, and then Clark realized his head had been resting on Bruce's lap. Bruce was gently setting his head down on the floor, and another face was coming into view above him. Dark hair like Bruce's.

"Hey," she said. She had a hand on his shoulder. "I'm sorry about all the magic. It was the only way we could think to get in and out undetected. I know it's not ideal. Just hang in there, okay?"

"Zatanna," he said, but not really because he remembered it. He had heard Bruce saying her name. 

"That's right," she said, with a squeeze of his shoulder. "It's _so_ good to see you Clark, you just don't know." He tried a smile, but didn't know how to tell her that her proximity was making the nausea worse.

"Not really. . . all that undetected," he murmured, as the Javelin gave another roll, and Hal let loose another stream of spectacular curses. 

"Everybody's a critic," she said warmly, but then a hot blackness rolled over him, and he surrendered to it gladly.


	6. Chapter 6

Leslie spread images of her scans along with her notes on the wide table, and waited while Bruce absorbed them. He didn't appreciate being talked to while he was studying things, she knew, so she let him look. He was clever enough to see the issue.

His quick eyes searched, read, frowned. His face was impassive as ever. "Basically, your theory is the absorption of sunlight has been blocked, in his body?"

"Exactly. It can't be more than a theory, I'm afraid. Even with all the information you've given me from the database in the Fortress, I'm still—" she made a small helpless gesture. "I'm like a child trying to glue a priceless vase back together. I barely have the capacity to understand how the pieces fit together, much less what composes them."

"I see." He paused at one piece of paper that was scribbled with her notes. 

"The fact is. . ." She paused. "The thing is, I'm a good surgeon, with a wide range of medical interests, and an able diagnostic mind. That—and your trust in me—is the reason I work here. So far that makes me the same as lots of good doctors. But I am also more expert in alien physiology than any single doctor practicing on Earth today. What I'm trying to tell you is, I'm the best at this, and even I don't understand what I'm doing here."

"Can you fix the problem?"

"I don't know. In theory, if I could find the mechanism that's blocking his body's absorption of solar radiation, then yes. But that's a little like saying nuclear fusion is possible, in theory. I might not have the ability to do it, is what I'm saying."

"But he is absorbing radiation," Bruce said. "He is getting better."

She hesitated, wondering how much to say. She had never pulled her punches with Bruce. "The rate of improvement is slowing," she said. "He's not regaining his strength. And there are. . . other issues."

"He's getting better," Bruce said, rising from the table. He pushed her notes toward her. "He'll be fine."

"Bruce, I wouldn't—"

But he was gone, his back a firm unheeding line. She pressed her lips together and stacked her notes and scans. She folded her hands on top of them like the answer might rise through the paper, magically, into the skin of her hands and rest there. But her hands remained as impermeable to knowledge as Clark's skin to sunlight. Maybe the answer was more intense radiation; maybe Green Lantern could fly him closer to the sun. Maybe. . . maybe any one of a hundred possibilities.

She pulled her most recent scans out and began the search for an answer again.

* * *

When he woke in the med bay, he lay there for a moment assembling the information he remembered. He was in the Watchtower—or someone wanted him to think he was. Which raised an interesting possibility: if his mind was being messed with again, it was possible the last year of being traded from slaver to slaver was also an illusion.

If so, it was the longest time-elapse scenario the New Genesians had ever attempted on him. That had been the interesting thing, that from the beginning it was his psychology they were fascinated by, his mind they had wanted to break. Well, that was a job well done, because he could no longer distinguish reality from orchestrated scenario, evidently. But was it possible? He thought he had memories of D'Neri eventually selling him off, when it was plain the kryptonite poisoning was terminal. But could that have been part of an elaborate scenario as well, another implanted memory?

Any minute now, a wall would phase out, and he would see D'Neri at the controls in the glass booth. _Subject has been compromised_ , she would say coolly. _End scenario._

Or, the past year had been real, and this was real too. Were those two things dependent on each other? Did one event flow into another? Linear time was beginning to confuse him. "I figured it out," he said aloud. "It's another fake rescue. You might as well go ahead and end it." He rolled over and went back to sleep, confident that when he woke he would be in another time and place. 

But when his eyes opened again, he was still in the med bay.

"Leslie said you were awake," said a softly graveled voice, that terrible, beautifully familiar voice, and the rush of longing in his center answered all his questions. It was real, this time. This time, the rescue was real, it had to be. The rescue simulations had been the hardest; those had been the ones he had wanted to believe in the most. It was Bruce, or it was Diana, or it was Hal and the entire Lantern Corps; always it was credible, always the feeling of relief and joy had been overwhelming, sharp as pain. But at the end of each simulation, as all his bliss dissolved into mist, came the gnawing terror of loss. He knew they were taking more, each time; more of his memories, more of his consciousness. He couldn't even tell anymore how much he had lost, only that something was gone, like an object he couldn't describe in a room he couldn't see, and all he knew was that it was gone. He couldn't even fix its shape. 

Bruce sat by the side of the bed. Clark studied his face. "I'm in a solar bed," he said. 

"Yes. You've been in it for most of the past week, off and on. You've been in and out of consciousness, but this is the first time you've spoken. How do you feel?"

He sat up, slowly, and swung his legs over the side of the bed. He reached over and found the switch on the side panel, and flipped it off. "You may as well stop," he said. "You and I both know it's not doing any good. After a certain point kryptonite poisoning can't be reversed." 

"You don't know that, not for a certainty."

He gave a short laugh. "If I've been here a week, the Bruce I remember would have already accessed everything the Fortress has in its files on kryptonite poisoning. You know it, for a certainty."

"Maybe I'm not the Bruce you remember."

Clark searched his face. "Maybe not," he admitted. And then he asked the question he had been dreading. "How long?"

"Five years."

If he had been standing, it would have knocked him to his knees. He swore, and then realized it had not been English, or Kryptonian, and bit his lip. "Five years," he repeated. Bruce was just sitting there, watching him. He was dressed in a suit, but no tie. Strange to see him on the Watchtower in civilian clothes.

"I see you got married," Clark said. It was really just a casual observation—the silver ring on his left hand was blindingly obvious, after all—but Bruce's face froze, and he swallowed, once, twice. And then he quickly looked down, at the ring.

"Yes," was all he said. 

"You don't look that happy about it. Did it not work out?"

"It's. . . complicated. Why don't you try lying down again?"

"She left you."

"Why do you assume I was the one who was left?"

"Because you're still wearing the ring. Leavers don't wear the ring. Leavees who can't move on keep the ring. Was it Selina?" And part of him felt an odd stirring at that. If he had been here, it probably wouldn't have happened. He had left Bruce alone, and Bruce had turned to Selina for comfort, and there had been no Clark to remind him what an incredibly bad idea that was. Well. His own life had been hard enough; he didn't have much sympathy to spare for Bruce. 

"You have to understand," Clark said. "I'm ninety-nine percent certain this is a simulation. The five-year jump in time is clever, because it does away with anything they get wrong. Your face, for instance. They made you look too old, or something. Bruce is better looking than that."

Bruce dropped his eyes. "Five years have passed," he said quietly. "And I was never classically handsome, in that way. Another respect in which we differ."

Clark got to his feet, unsteadily. He saw Bruce almost reach a hand to help him, and stop himself. The room slid to one side, and he gripped the bed's siderails for support. He saw Bruce bite his lip. "You need to move slowly," Bruce said. 

Clark ignored him and took a few halting steps. Whatever the last week in bed had brought him, it wasn't improvement. "Five years," he said again. "It took you five years to come get me?"

A muscle clenched in the side of Bruce's face. "I failed you," he said. "I know that. But for five years, we have been trying. Everyone has been trying. If the New Genesians hadn't sold you eighteen months ago, I doubt we would have succeeded. For the last six months, we've been one lead behind. Last week was our first real chance."

"Congratulations," Clark said. "Job well done. And I suppose this is where you tell me why the League sent me away in the first place?"

There was a beat before Bruce answered. "No one sent you away," he said. "You went voluntarily. You sold yourself to the New Genesians."

"I—no, because— _stop_ ," Clark said, a hand to his head. "That isn't right."

"It is," Bruce said. "I was. . . ill. Injured. You sold yourself for the technology to fix me. It was intended to be for a two-year term, and the New Genesians violated that. But you succeeded in what you set out to do."

"That—it doesn't make any _sense_ ," Clark said. His head was beginning to pound. "Why would I—injured _how?_ And who hurt you? I would never have let anyone—ah," he gasped, as the pain in his head intensified.

Bruce was at his side. "We can talk about it later," he was saying. "We don't have to—"

"We will talk about it _now_ ," Clark said, through gritted teeth. The room was filling with spangled stars, like a migraine. Was this a migraine? He'd never had one.

"Later on, when you're stronger. We can discuss all of—"

"I said _now_ ," Clark roared, and he grabbed the hand that had been resting on his shoulder like it _owned_ him, who did he think he was, how dare he. He spun around and wrenched at the offending wrist with all his force. He heard the snap of bone, the guttural yell of pain as knees hit the floor. It filled him with dull satisfaction. Someone was running in the door, shouting his name. He felt nothing.

"Good God, Clark, what did you—get away from him, let go of him—" The doctor, the one whose name he couldn't remember, was shouting, calling for sedatives and medics and who knew what else, it was irrelevant.

"I'm fine," said Bruce's voice, a harsh crackle of itself. "Leave it alone, I'm fine."

"He just broke every bone in your hand, and you're telling me you're _fine?_ Jesus Christ, Bruce. Get out of here right now, get away from him, come on, let's get you to the infirmary—thank the dear Lord for your high pain threshold. Come on, I've got you, let's go—"

"Go on, get out of here," Clark taunted them. He watched them go, heard the door shut behind them, and still felt nothing. He went back to his bed and stretched out on it, closing his eyes. Who knew where he would wake—here, or back on Trallia, or in the simulation wards of New Genesis. Nothing mattered any more.

* * *

He woke in the same place.

Surprising, and not at all expected. Generally a simulation would end when he displayed violence, and it hadn't been hard after a while to figure out that that was what they were looking for: the moment when the wild Kryptonian monster would unleash. A quick display of violence usually got him the reward of an early end to the simulation, and a return to the blank nothingness of sleep.

So he was surprised to wake up in the same place. He was still on the Watchtower, in the med bay. But if he was still here, and a display of berserk violence had not ended it, then—

He sat up quickly this time. "Bruce," he said, a thud of panic trip-hammering in his chest. "Bruce!"

He was alone in the room, and the door was locked. He jiggled the handle. "Bruce!" he shouted. He tried banging on the door, but there was no answer. "Bruce!" He hammered with both fists on the door, but it wouldn't give, and there was no one on the other side—he was alone, they had left him in here, as punishment for what he did they had all gone away and left him alone, spinning forever in space, in the darkness, he would never see any of them again, never see— _"Bruce! Bruce!"_

Then the sound of running feet, of angry yelling, and the door was being wrenched open. Bruce's voice rose over all the shouting. "You _locked_ him in here, I gave strict orders he was not to be restrained, you dared to _lock_ him in like a—"

"I had no other choice," the woman's voice was answering back, just as angrily. "After what happened to you, you think I'm going to take the risk of him running loose and hurting more people? He's not stable enough to—"

"That's _ENOUGH_ ," Bruce yelled, his face contorted with rage, and Clark had never seen him like this, never seen him shout like that at Leslie— _Leslie_ , that was her name, of course it was Leslie, had been Leslie all along. But then he saw the sling and bandage wrapped around Bruce's arm and fell to his knees.

"Oh God," he moaned. "Oh God, Bruce—I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, what have I done, I'm so sorry—" He reached hesitantly for Bruce's wounded arm, afraid almost to touch him.

"Shh shh shh," Bruce was saying, on his knees now beside Clark, holding him up. "It's all right, it's fine, it doesn't hurt, you didn't know, shh shh."

"I didn't mean to," he gasped. "God, God help me."

"Leave us," Bruce said. "Give us the room." Only then was Clark aware there were other people standing around, and he couldn't bear to see who, couldn't bear to look at any of them. _Give us the room_. And something. . . it was almost like a memory, of being in this exact place, Bruce saying those exact words. Only Bruce had been sitting on a bed, and he. . . he himself was. . .

"You were blind," Clark said suddenly. "That was your injury. Wasn't it?"

"Yes," Bruce said. "It will come to you, don't worry."

He collapsed back into Bruce's arms. "And if it doesn't," he said. "What then?"

"Then we cross that bridge when we come to it," Bruce said.

"Alfred would be proud of your platitudes," he murmured, and felt the small laugh in Bruce's chest. He was a little surprised Bruce was holding him like this; this sort of physical demonstrativeness was not part of their friendship, but he supposed that lots of things changed, when you had been gone for five years. He felt a small hungry stir in him, in a part of him he had thought long dead, at the feeling of Bruce's good hand stroking his back.

Some things, apparently, did not change.


	7. Chapter 7

"You think this is a good idea," Hal said. "You can honestly tell me you are one hundred percent behind this idea."

Bruce frowned in irritation and went back to his chem analysis—or rather, the chem analysis he had been pretending to run for the last five minutes. The more he could stare into a microscope, the greater his chances of discouraging Hal. At least, that was the hope. So far it did not appear to be working, since the man was still leaning against the nearby cabinets, his arms crossed like he owned the place. 

"I can honestly tell you it is what's happening," Bruce replied, trying to keep a lid on his irritation. 

"You think it's safe."

His irritation arced into something quit a bit more, and he deepened and stilled his breathing. " _Safe_ ," he repeated. "If you refer to Clark as some kind of rabid dog one more time—"

"Hey," Hal interrupted. "That's not what I meant. Bruce—" He ran a hand through his hair. "Fuck. I'm just worried about you, is all. All right?"

"Your concern is as unwelcome as your presence."

"Well fuck you too," Hal said quietly. And then there was nothing but the noise of him ascending the metal stairs to the upper door of the cave, and Bruce swore internally. That had not been exactly what he had meant to say; almost he called him back. In the last few years, Jordan's support—and yes, friendship, he would not hesitate to call it that now—had been notable, even when others had been less forthcoming. There had been those voices encouraging him to call off the search, reasoning that Clark had long since died, that Bruce was needlessly tormenting himself and draining the League's resources. Jordan had been the loudest voice arguing against them, if "why don't you all go fuck yourselves" (as well as more colorful and anatomically improbable suggestions) could be considered an argument. 

"Your turn," he heard Hal mutter at the top of the stairs, and then Dick was trotting down to talk to him. He glued his face more resolutely to the microscope.

"Not you too," he said. 

"Not me what?"

"You're not going to try to persuade me that Clark should leave."

"No," Dick said. 

"So you disagree with Hal?"

"I wouldn't say that," was Dick's careful response.

"This is his home," Bruce said sharply. "Where else should he stay?"

"Sure," said Dick. "I see that. But the thing is. . . he doesn't really know that it's his home, does he?"

"He will."

"Maybe. But I was also wondering, because did you guys really work out the whole 'who lives where' thing five years ago?" 

Bruce said nothing, but aimed a glare his direction. Dick sighed. "It's just. . . I'm not as sure as you that you could call the Manor Clark's home, per se."

"It's as much his home as anywhere else."

"Well, I'm just saying he might feel more comfortable—make better progress—in more familiar surroundings. Like his own apartment in Metropolis."

"He's making plenty of progress. And are you suggesting he live on his own right now?"

"I'm just saying. . . I'm just saying, Hal's concern is shared. By me, and. . . others."

Bruce set the microscope aside. "Married people share a home," he said.

"Right. But your married life consisted of—correct me if I'm wrong—four whole hours?"

Bruce slammed the lumoscope down with a bang. "Are you finished?"

Dick was silent, and Bruce turned back to his work. But he couldn't focus on any of it; it swam in front of his eyes. Sleep, he needed sleep. Well, he could sleep when Clark was better. "There are a lot of people who care about you, Bruce," Dick said. He hated Dick's quiet voice, his _I'm trying hard not to upset you_ voice. You would think he would have learned by now that few things were as upsetting as someone trying not to upset you.

"And damn few people who care about Clark, it seems," he said.

"That's not fair. The League just traveled halfway across the galaxy to rescue him, and for—"

"Because I made them. If I hadn't yelled and threatened and coerced—"

"Bruce, people were just pointing out potential problems, no one ever suggested—"

"Leave me alone. Go on, just—get out of here." He rubbed at his forehead. He needed to sleep. He should have slept last night, should have taken something if he had to. And today, nothing he said came out right. It wouldn't do to be around Clark like that. Clark—Clark wouldn't want him to talk to Dick like that. How many years had he tried that trick on himself? Clark wouldn't like that, Clark wouldn't want that, Clark would do this thing, not that thing. Clark had been in his head for so long. And now Clark was here—confused, disordered, violent—and Bruce was powerless to help. But Clark wouldn't want him to talk to Dick like that.

"I'm—sorry," he said faintly. "I. . . haven't been sleeping. Will you. . . apologize to Hal for me."

There was a slide of hand on his shoulder, and a squeeze. "Sure thing, B." Bruce fought a fresh surge of anger— _don't call me that, that name isn't yours to use_. But he forced it down.

He listened to Dick's retreat, and wrapped up his futile morning's work down in the cave before heading upstairs. He knew Dick was probably still around somewhere, and maybe even Tim, but he had no desire to talk to anyone. Well, except for one person, and he found her in the kitchen. Standing at the vast gleaming counter, making sandwiches, of all things. They were piled on a platter, enough to feed an army, and she was resolutely making more. He washed his hands in the sink and leaned against the counter, watching her. 

"The world could end," he said with a bleak smile, "and you would be making sure everyone had enough sandwiches."

She smiled back. He caught the strain in it, the same exhaustion his own face wore. He doubted she had had much sleep either. "Well dear," she said, "if the world does end, I guarantee you somebody in this house will still be hungry. And then. . . turkey on rye is his favorite."

"It looks great."

She cocked a skeptical brow at him. "If it looks so great, why aren't you eating?"

"I ate downstairs."

"Liar." She picked up a sandwich and thrust it in his hand. "Eat. You're no good to him or anyone else if you collapse."

He looked at the sandwich. He knew she was right; he needed to put something in his mouth. But everything seemed to taste the same, like soggy cardboard, and it repulsed him. For her sake, he took a bite and gamely chewed his way through it. "I have to get upstairs," he said, setting the sandwich down. 

"I'll be up with a tray in a bit. Hold up a minute, dear." She opened the refrigerator and took out a chilled bottle. "I knew you wouldn't eat that sandwich. Here, at least drink some of this. I've been playing with Alfred's recipes, seeing if I can't make them a little more appealing. Drink as much of that as you can."

"Playing with his recipes, hm? I wouldn't tell him that."

"Well, I'm not an _idiot_."

He took a sip of the protein drink. He had to admit, it had more flavor to it than they normally did. "Not bad. Do I want to know what you did, or should I just wait and complain when my pants no longer fit?"

She laughed, and patted his cheek, then leaned in and kissed him. "Well, that's a conversation for another day, but you could stand with putting on about fifteen pounds, and we both know it."

Ordinarily he tolerated her caresses with good grace, but today he reached for her and folded her in his arms. If she was startled, she didn't show it. "My sweet boy," she sighed, her arm around his neck. She felt so small and fragile in his arms, but he knew that was illusion: she was all sturdy wire and muscle, in that thin frame.

There were any number of things he wanted to promise her: _everything's going to be fine, I'm going to make it all better, I'll fix everything_. Instead he just held her, because of all the things he could do, lie to her was not one of them. 

"Go on," she said, patting his shoulder. "I'll bring the sandwiches up in a bit." Titus wandered in and reached the sandwich Bruce had set on the counter with ease, swallowing it in a single bite. He looked to her expectantly, clearly hoping for more.

"Drat that dog," she sighed. Bruce made his way up the kitchen stairs, all the way to the third floor. He had thought this would give Clark more privacy, and the third floor got the best light. Some instinct told him the light would be important, or maybe he was still cherishing the hope Clark would begin absorbing sunlight. He paused outside the closed door, listening for any sound. He knocked hesitantly, and entered when he heard nothing.

Clark was in the corner of his room, sitting cross-legged, his back against the wall, head tipped back, eyes closed. 

Not a good day, then.

"Do you know what's strange," Clark said, without opening his eyes. "The way things will shut on and off. Sometimes I have my strength, sometimes I don't. Sometimes I have the full use of my body, sometimes I don't. Most of the time, I can't hear anything beyond this room. But sometimes, like a radio cutting on and off, I can hear Alfred muttering to himself in the back garden. This morning he is more than a little irritated at you. Why?"

"Pick a reason," Bruce said easily, coming to sit on the floor opposite him. Some days Clark used the furniture, and some days he did not. 

"Tell me." Clark opened his eyes. Startling eyes — they had always been that, in their unearthly, beautiful blue. Now, against the gray pallor of his skin, they shone even more beautifully. 

"I was short-tempered this morning."

"With Alfred?"

"With others."

"In front of him?"

"Things don't need to happen in front of Alfred for him to know about them. That much I'm sure you remember."

That got him a wan smile, and he decided to capitalize on it. "It's going on lunchtime," he said. "A good time for a walk in the gardens. Care to come with me?"

"I'm good," he said listlessly. "I wanted to ask you something. But I know I must have asked it before."

"It's all right."

"My mother brought me breakfast this morning. When did she get here?"

Bruce studied his hands. Not a good day at all. He could only imagine the morning's scene — Clark's joy at seeing his mother, how his tight embrace must have felt so good to her, even as she fought back her tears that once again, he had forgotten. "I'm sorry," Clark said softly. "I forgot something important again." 

"It's fine. It's all right. Your mother lives here now. This is her home."

Clark was frowning. Even bad days were not as bad as the days when he asked the question Bruce could see hovering on his lips, the question that always—

"Where is my father?"

Bruce held himself still, and held Clark's eyes. "Your father is dead."

And then, in agony, he watched Clark's agony: his almost weekly agony, as Clark curled over on himself, fists to his head, absorbing anew the shock and grief of his father's death. He could take it; had taken it. Better him to witness this than Martha. Sometimes it helped to hear the details, and sometimes Clark could not bear to hear them.

"It was pancreatic cancer," Bruce said softly. "Three years ago. It was very swift. He did not die in pain, or alone. I swear to you. He had the best of everything. I was with him, and your mother was with him. He spoke of you often. He knew you would be there if you could. He worried more for your grief than anything else. He loved you very much." His own throat clenched shut, as he remembered Jonathan's last hours, the weakened man's grip on his arm, the clear eyes that—oh worst, worst of all—forgave him. He had sobbed on Jonathan's chest. _Your son, I killed your son, oh God I'm so sorry, I killed him_. And Jonathan's hand tugging at his hair. _No son, you didn't. Clark walked straight on into everything he ever did_. Bruce's sobs had torn at his chest, his throat, had burned like fire. 

"Where—where did you tell him I was?" Clark's voice was thick with unshed tears.

"I told him the truth. I told both of them the truth, finally. All of it. I thought the time for half-truths was over."

Clark was still bent double, his fists clenched in a grief that looked like anger. Probably it was; his emotions were as volatile and unstable as his memory, these days. "Is anyone else—gone? Have I—did I—she had to sell the farm, I wasn't there to help, I should have—"

"No. Clark, she didn't sell the farm. The farm is still there, I promise. We can go there if you like. We can visit your father's grave."

"Yes," he said numbly. "Please. I—" And then a keen look at Bruce. "Have we done that before?"

He hesitated. "Yes."

"Dammit," Clark moaned, and curled over on himself again. Bruce ached to reach for him, to touch him. But the one or two times he had tried that it had not gone well. 

"Let's go for that walk," Bruce suggested, but Clark shook his head.

"No. No. I don't—I can't do that. Not today. Tell me. . . tell me something good that happened while I was gone. Tell me. . . tell me about your wedding."

Bruce froze. Of all the questions Clark regularly threw at him, that was not one he had fielded yet. He was unprepared, and looked back down at his hands. "That happened before you left, actually," he said. 

"It did?"

"Ah, yes."

"Was I there?" Clark asked.

"Of course."

"Was I best man?"

"No, that was Dick."

"Hm. I think that would have irritated me. Was I irritated?"

"I promise you, no. Clark. We need to go for a walk. Right now is the best sunlight available, we have to try to get you out in it. It will be a short walk, I promise. Alfred has been working in the iris beds."

Clark was looking at him keenly. "You don't want to talk about your wedding," he said. 

"I don't."

"Because you're still in love."

Bruce swallowed. "Among other reasons, yes."

Clark made an impatient gesture. "For God's sake," he said. "I can't believe I let you go through with that. Of course Selina was going to leave you. She never deserved you, ever."

"We should go for that walk. It might be too hot later on, and the sun—"

The endtable beside Clark slid across the room at a terrifying velocity and crashed into the wall by his head, missing him by an inch. "I said _I don't want to go for a walk!"_

He had kicked the table with his foot, and it had practically planted itself in the plaster of the opposite wall. He might not see it, but his strength was getting more reliable, day by day. _And how's that control coming along?_ said the voice in his head, the one he regularly ignored. 

"Shit," Clark breathed, and he was crouching beside Bruce. "Are you all right? Dammit, I didn't mean to do that. I don't know what—I just—"

 _He could kill you_ , Dick had pointed out just yesterday. _With a flick of his finger he could kill you. Your hand is barely healed as it is._

It's fine, Bruce had said, because that was what he always said.

"Forgive me," Clark was saying, kneeling by him, eyes as straightforward and beautiful as ever, and it was Clark, no one but Clark. Because he couldn't stop himself, Bruce put a hand on the side of his face. 

"It's all right," he said. "Don't worry about it."

He stood and held out a hand to Clark. "Guess what I'm going to say now, though."

Clark groaned. "The damn walk. Right. Okay, fine, let's go. I guess, if a crazy man tries to murder you, you should at least get something out of it."

"Don't say that. You're not crazy."

"Bruce." Clark's eyes were sad. "I think we both know the truth here."

In silence they walked downstairs and out the back terrace to the walled gardens below, the more private ones where Clark liked to walk, when he could stand to be outdoors. They said nothing; most of the time they spent together they didn't talk, really. It was enough just to be with him, and Bruce was convinced that Clark was calmer, more centered, his memory and focus improved, when Bruce was with him. Or maybe it was just that it made Bruce feel better. 

They strolled around the little bricked garden, and the reflecting pond that was Alfred's pride. The crop of lily pads was flourishing, and a fat, idle duck poked underneath them. "You know what surprises me," Clark said suddenly, and Bruce glanced at the water, thinking it had something to do with the duck. "What surprises me about you getting married is that I actually thought you were gay. I mean, I know you dated women, but I never really felt like it was that. . . interesting to you. So that surprised me."

"I'm bi," Bruce said. Clark's senses seemed to be fully functioning today, which meant he would be aware of the wild leap of Bruce's heart rate, the staccato of his pulse. 

"Mm," Clark said, like they were talking about the garden. That was another thing about Clark now—he would say the most extraordinary things, all filters removed. Suddenly he stopped walking. "I bet we fought about it," he said. "That's why you don't want to talk about your wedding, and ignore me every time I say her name. I bet I tried to talk you out of it, and we fought, and that's why I wasn't best man."

"That's not why you weren't best man. And I promise you, we didn't fight."

"Mm," Clark said again. "I've been thinking," he said.

"What about?"

"I was thinking I ought to move back to Smallville. Back to the farm. My mother can go with me. She doesn't need to stay here anymore, just because I'm here. I would probably recover just as fast—faster maybe—if I were back home." 

"Well," Bruce said carefully. "Have you mentioned this to your mother?"

"Not yet. I thought maybe I would after lunch. Although who knows, maybe I'll forget again."

"She's lived here for three years," Bruce said. "This is her home now."

"My mother's home is with me. I appreciate that you looked after her while I was away, but I'm back now. She doesn't need to stay here."

"I wouldn't say that I was the one doing the looking after," Bruce said. "I've been grateful for your mother's presence here. And then. . . she might not care to go."

Clark was frowning. "What does that mean? What on earth does she have to make her want to stay here?"

Bruce said nothing. It was possible Clark really hadn't seen it; it was also possible he just didn't want to. Even worse, it was possible he had seen it, and removing his mother to Smallville was his response to the situation. "She's happy here," was all Bruce said. 

"I'm not an idiot. I'm aware of why you think she's happy. I'm telling you, she belongs in Smallville."

"Yes by all means," Bruce said. "Take her back to Smallville like a child who's being punished for possibly finding happiness with another person who cares about her deeply. Why don't you tie her to your father's grave while you're at it, and take her food once a day. That way if her display of grief doesn't satisfy you, you can always withhold—"

The backhand to his jaw felled him with no trouble, and he was calculating the extent of damage even before he tried to stagger up. _Stay down, fool_ , his brain said, but as it turned out he didn't have a choice—the pain lanced up the side of his face, his head. Could be a crack in the bone. He was dizzy with the pain. He clutched at the stone bench by the pond, steadying himself. 

It had not happened before that Clark had struck him. 

Clark was crouching beside him, and Bruce knew what was coming—the agony of apology, the crushing remorse for a moment's loss of control. He held up his hand to forestall it. "You think I'm going to apologize," Clark said softly. "I'm not going to apologize. There is no acceptable apology for what I just did. I would never presume to ask it. Even if you forget it, even if you forgive it, I never will. But it's another reason I shouldn't be anywhere around here."

"No," Bruce whispered. "I can. . . help you."

"Really," Clark said. "How's that going for you?"

He lifted Bruce's hand with gentle fingers, and held it loosely in his own. "Bruce. I'm dying. We both know it. The kryptonite poisoning is far too advanced for you or anyone else to stop. I'm not in control of my mind or my senses, and it's only going to get worse. I'm dying. I need to hear you say that you understand that."

"No," Bruce said. "I won't. I can find a way. I can. . . there's always a way."

"Not always, old friend," he said. He rose and stared at the pond, hugging his arms tightly. "I'm going to walk for a bit more. You need to go back to the house and let Alfred look at that jaw."

Bruce nodded and rose. He could feel the thrum in the whole side of his face. Clark was regarding him sorrowfully. He left Clark there, hands in his pockets, staring at the duck pond with the same remote, abstracted gaze he turned on everything, and walked back to the house. He had hoped to avoid Martha entirely by going through the conservatory doors and so up the main stairs, but she had obviously just come from upstairs and met him in the hall. "Oh my word," she said, seeing his face. "What on earth—"

"Damn root system under that brick," he muttered, holding his hand to his face. "It's been a problem for months. Fell flat on my face coming up the walk."

She was looking at him with a gaze not unlike her son's. Her eyes lingered on his just a little too long, and he dropped his too quickly. Clark hadn't learned how to spot a lie entirely from his Kryptonian senses; a fair amount of it had come to him from Martha Kent, whose steady gray-eyed gaze could make anyone shift uncomfortably. "I'll get Alfred," she said, and she squeezed his hand as she passed him. 

Alfred, of course, said nothing. He tended Bruce's injury in a silence that was neither judgmental nor disapproving. He had had long experience of Alfred's silences, and he could read them better than any words. This particular silence was the silence of _I think what you are doing is very foolish but I know better than anyone how unlikely you are to be swayed from this course of action so I will not waste my breath_. It was Bruce's least favorite silence. 

"You might at least go ahead and say it," Bruce muttered, after the shot of painkillers was beginning to take effect. 

"Say what, sir?"

"You think having Clark here is a bad idea too."

He was silent again, and Bruce assumed that was his answer, until after a few minutes he spoke. His back was to Bruce, as he was tidying his instruments. "It might surprise you to know that I don't," he said. "Think Master Clark's residence here is a bad idea, that is. But in truth I was quiet just now because I was thinking of how to broach another topic."

"Oh? Well, ask me now, before the meds wear off."

"That was certainly my intention. I have been considering taking a brief vacation, the truth is. Nothing too long. Not above a fortnight, I'd say. Do you think you could spare me for a bit?"

"Of course," Bruce said in some surprise. "I can't remember the last time you took a vacation. Take several, you probably have them coming to you. Where do you think you might want to go?"

"The Lake Country, I was thinking. Possibly Scotland. Possibly a tour of. . . well, various places around England. Places where I used to live, that sort of thing."

"Feeling nostalgic?"

"Something like that. But the thing of it is, sir, I was thinking I might not go alone."

Bruce watched his face. Alfred was cleaning an instrument meticulously—the same instrument he had been cleaning for the last five minutes, in fact. It was gleaming. "Ah," Bruce said, and if his face hadn't been partially numbed, he would have given a little smile. "I see."

"We have. . . discussed it. Not until Master Clark is recovered, of course. But she has expressed a desire to see some of my old haunts, and I confess I. . . would very much like to show her. With your permission, of course."

"You don't need my permission. You're two grown adults, go do whatever you'd like to do. I'm happy for you."

Alfred was watching him keenly. "You're not shocked?"

"Shocked? Well, shocked would have been the word for when I walked in on the two of you making out like oversexed teenagers in the iris garden three months ago. But I'm happy to act surprised now if you want me to."

"A civil tongue, please," Alfred said, injecting the last dose in Bruce's arm rather more firmly than he needed to, and making Bruce wince. "You'll be respectful of your elders."

"You'll be respectful of your hip," Bruce said. "I don't need you in traction for four weeks because you two couldn't show some self-restraint."

" _Making out_ indeed," Alfred muttered. "The very idea."

"Well, I admit it's been a while, but that was what it looked like to me." He slid off the table, probing at his jaw with tentative fingers. "Thank you, Alfred."

This silence was the silence of _I'm going to ignore the ridiculousness of you thanking me for something we do all the time, particularly when you're using it as a way to deflect talking about actual things_. His life, he reflected, would be much easier if Alfred would consider using words, but then that would probably not be nearly as effective. "Alfred," he said on the stairs. 

"Sir?"

"Don't wait until Clark recovers. Take her now. It will be all right." 

Alfred nodded slowly and held his eyes, and this time they both knew what the silence said.


	8. Chapter 8

He lay awake that night, unable to sleep, and unable to pretend he wanted to sleep. Most nights he simply lay there until the house had gone to bed, and then he would quietly get up and move about, so as not to disturb anyone. The sleeplessness was probably a result of the kryptonite poisoning; as his body was winding down, slowly surrendering, it seemed less and less willing to give up consciousness, for any reason. 

It was too bad, because sleep was the only place where the chaotic rush of disjointed memories and thoughts stopped assaulting him. He would have liked to sleep. 

Tonight, though, he was too busy replaying in his head every second of the afternoon—or rather, the few seconds it had taken him to backhand Bruce across the face. Only someone with his brain's ability to slow and analyze time could really get the full effect of every agonizing nanosecond of what had happened: the sick smack of flesh, Bruce's low gasp of pain (inaudible to most humans, but terrifyingly audible to him), the crack of Bruce's knees on the brick as he went down. _Smack moan crack, smack moan crack_ , over and over in his head. He wanted to rip his skull apart to take out the sound.

Point of interest: could he in fact kill himself?

It would take some inventiveness, that was for sure. 

After a while he threw back the covers and began to wander in his customary fashion. He wandered the third floor, where his room was, and then he headed to the second floor. On noiseless feet he wandered into Damian's room, and stood there watching him for a long time, because Damian, of all of them, was the most astonishing, for him. He remembered a tiny little spitfire of a boy, not this tall gangly young man who slept athwart his bed, his body almost as long as the Great Dane's stretched beside him: this boy with the gravelly voice who slouched against the kitchen counter and sneaked sandwiches from his mother, this boy whose strength and prowess were becoming a thing of beauty to see, this boy who could look so like Bruce that it took Clark's breath away. Sometimes Damian would quickly turn, and in that motion Clark would see so much Bruce he wanted to reach out and touch him in wonder. 

He slipped out of Damian's room and went to his mother's. He stood there for a long time, thinking about his conversation with Bruce that afternoon. In many ways she looked oddly younger than he remembered—her hair a bit longer, her lean frame even leaner, her movements quicker. In other ways she had aged beyond his capacity to absorb, and he would see it in her eyes when she looked at him or stroked his hair. The punishing losses she had absorbed in the last few years—her son, and then her husband—had changed her in ways he could never understand, and that filled him with a crippling guilt when he was around her. Bruce had accused him of wanting to lash her to his father's tombstone, but he had been wrong. It was himself he wanted to lash there, himself he wished to punish forever. 

Bruce. . . 

Without knowing it, he was standing in Bruce's room next. He had a moment of panic when he realized he did not remember how he got there. Sometimes it would happen—bits of time would simply be lost, as his brain and memories went offline. _Like an unstable gravitational field_ , he had said to Bruce just last week, trying to explain it. But his explanation this afternoon had not been wrong: like death. Because it was death, and he knew it now. He had less time than any of them thought; less time than he knew Bruce was reckoning. He could feel it, slipping from him, hour by hour.

He watched Bruce, and this was his favorite part of the long sleepless nights: Bruce's beautiful body stretched boneless on the bed, his hair tousled, his face peaceful. His sleeping scent was stronger than his waking scent, and Clark inhaled it. Bruce slept naked, of course, and Clark did not stop himself from looking everywhere he wanted to look. He didn't touch, of course. But maybe his eyes were lingering longer than they normally did on places he had no business looking, because when he glanced up again, Bruce's eyes were open and watching him. 

_I'm sorry_ , he opened his mouth to say, flushing. He found he couldn't make a sound.

The sheets had been tangled around Bruce's legs, and he kicked himself free now. Clark swallowed at the sight of all that beauty on display. Bruce was half-hard in his sleep. It made his own balls contract, to look at him. He turned his face away. "Sorry," he said, finding his voice.

"Don't be," Bruce said. "Look all you like."

 _I'm bi_ , Bruce had said just this afternoon. But that didn't mean he wanted his best friend ogling him. Clark was grateful that Bruce's eyes could not see his flush in the dark. Bruce's eyes. . . a memory tugged at him, like a riptide at the beach. They were constantly pushing and pulling at him; he lived in their eddies, never knowing what was true and what was his paranoia and damaged brain.

"I. . ." Clark began.

"Do you want to lie down," Bruce said. Like it was a natural thing, like maybe his walk from the third floor had exhausted him. He nodded, and Bruce edged over, making room for him on the bed. He stretched himself carefully on the bed beside Bruce, lying there as stiff as a grave monument. 

"It's a warm night," Bruce whispered. "I should have had Alfred turn on the air conditioning. You could take your clothes off too."

He was wearing his bathrobe and a pair of shorts. "I. . . can't," he said.

"Why not?"

"Because I. . . because you. . . I'm hard," he said, and the flush on his face felt like a burn now.

"Well that's all right," Bruce said. "I am too, a little."

Clark dared another glance. "You," he said, and swallowed. 

"Go on," Bruce said, and Clark sat up, slipped off his robe. After another hesitation he lifted his hips and slipped off his shorts, and then he was as naked as Bruce. Bruce was looking at him in a way that Bruce did not, in general, look at him. 

"Before I. . . went away," Clark tried. It felt strange to say it, when it felt like everyone else had gone away from him. "I. . . you didn't know. But I. . . had feelings. . . thoughts. About you. About. . ."

"Touching me?" Bruce said quietly. Clark nodded. 

"You could, if you wanted," Bruce said.

Clark knew his swallow was audible. "It. . . would make me. . . I would want to. . . "

"Come?"

Clark nodded again. Bruce was silent. Then he put a hand on Clark's abdomen. The hand felt burning hot. "You could do that too, if you wanted."

Bruce's hand moved a bit lower. Clark felt himself arch up. "Can I," Bruce whispered, and Clark still just nodded.

Bruce's fingers brushed his cock. Clark couldn't stop the noise he made. "It's all right," Bruce said, that same calm voice. "You can make as much noise as you want. Do you want to come?"

"God yes," he groaned. This was another delusion, another disordered memory, another fevered fantasy of his own sick brain. But he didn't care. Bruce's fingers were still just brushing him, moving lightly up and down his cock, not even stroking yet. The delicious ache and swell in his balls felt so good. It had been so long. 

"Bruce," he gasped. "Can I—can I touch you too."

"Please," Bruce said, and there was a small shake in his voice that went straight to Clark's balls. Then they were silently stroking each other, watching each other.

"You feel so good," Clark said. He could see Bruce's breathing increase, hear his heart beat quicken. "We. . . shouldn't be doing this."

"Don't you want to?"

"I—yes but I—" He bit his lip and turned his head. His hips had a mind of their own. They kept pushing up into Bruce's hand. Bruce's cock in his hand felt incredible, all steel and silk and warmth and a little bit of slick at the tip. Bruce's cock, he was touching Bruce's cock. He couldn't remember what he was going to say. His hand moved faster, and so did Bruce's. 

"Don't look away," Bruce whispered.

Clark turned his head, and Bruce's beautiful face, beautiful eyes, were right there, just watching him. Bruce's mouth was open, and he was breathing fast. his hand was going to make Bruce come. "Want to kiss you," Clark said.

"Yes," Bruce said, but it was more of a moan, and then Clark was more or less climbing on top of him, using both hands on his face, pressing their lips together for that first electric touch. His hips were still moving though, moving into Bruce's. He was on top of Bruce now, rubbing against him. 

"This—is this okay," he managed.

"God," Bruce said, kissing him back fiercely. He had not known Bruce could kiss like that. Would want to kiss him like that. He thought of Bruce kissing Selina like that and wanted to be sick. He would kiss the memory of anyone else out of Bruce, even if it was just this dream Bruce.

"Can—can you," he panted, and Bruce nodded underneath him. Clark kept the motion of his hips steady, letting his skin drag along Bruce's cock, trying to give him friction. He lowered his mouth to Bruce's again, trying to obliterate anything and anyone else from Bruce's mind. He pinned Bruce's arms to he bed, pinned Bruce's cock with his hips, pinned Bruce's mouth with his. Bruce began shaking.

He was shaking so hard Clark was afraid he was going to come apart, but then he gave a low rich groan, and the motion of his hips became jerky as he spasmed up, and Clark felt him come—felt the hot streak of Bruce's come on his skin. Clark groaned too and humped him harder, riding his cock right through the hot puddle of slick, and he curled down into Bruce's body harder.

"I'm—coming," he panted in Bruce's ear, and then he was, spurts that liquefied his spine, shudders that tore another groan from him. "Oh. . . oh God."

Bruce's arms were gripping him back, tight. "That's it," he murmured. "That's it baby, come for me, it's been so—"

Clark's shudders subsided, and the room's spinning slowed. Bruce's arms cradled him. After a while Clark closed his eyes. It felt oddly natural, to lie in Bruce's arms like this, with none of the awkwardness he had imagined there would be. Bruce seemed calmly accepting that his best friend—granted, his mentally damaged best friend—had just climbed into bed with him. Now Bruce's hand was stroking his back, slowly. It was nice.

Clark's eyes flew open. 

"Been so what," he said. He felt the stutter in the motion of Bruce's hand, and then Bruce's "hmm?" like he didn't know exactly what Clark was talking about.

Clark vaulted off him. Stood there glaring at him. Bruce was frowning. "Come lie down," he said. "What's the—"

"Been so _long_ ," Clark finished. "That's what you were about to say, before you stopped yourself."

Bruce's face was blank, but that didn't matter, he could read the clench of cardiac muscle, the widened capillaries, the patter of heart rate, and damn him, God damn him. "Damn you," Clark said with shaking voice. "We've done this before."

"Yes."

" _Liar_ ," Clark said. "You lied to me, and. . ." He stopped, and it was his turn to feel his heart contract, to feel the rush of blood flooding his body. "Give me your hand," he said.

"Why?"

"Give it to me."

Bruce extended his right hand, and Clark knocked it away, seized his left one instead. He began to tug at the silver ring on it, and Bruce's hand knotted into a fist. "Stop," Bruce said. "Stop that."

"Give me your ring."

"No."

"You didn't marry Selina, did you."

Bruce swallowed, and kept his gaze on the sheets. Damn him. "You didn't marry Selina, and that's why you never wanted to talk about her. That's why you always deflected it when I tried to talk about your wedding. You were right, I wasn't best man at your wedding, was I?"

Silently, Bruce shook his head. 

"Say it," Clark said. " _Say it!_ " He shouted when there was no response.

"We," Bruce said, and licked his lips. "We were the ones who were married."

Clark held out his hand. "Give me the ring," he said. Bruce complied. The small silver band rested in Clark's palm. He didn't have to read the inscription inside to know what it would say, but he lifted it anyway. _Iz kin lyagren_ , it read, in perfect Kryptonian script. Bruce was still not looking at him.

Clark sat on the edge of the bed, clutching the ring. Clutching his head. Memories, thoughts, ideas were pummeling his brain, and he didn't know which one to catch at. "You lied to me," Clark said. He could not get beyond this one fact. 

"I thought it best."

Clark flung the ring. It pinged off the wall, rolled on the carpet. "You _always_ think you know best!" he shouted. "You always think—no one else is ever good enough—you have to be the only one who _knows_ —God _damn_ you for doing this to me, God _damn_ you for your lies, God _damn_ you—"

Somehow he was standing over top of Bruce, yelling. Bruce was still not looking at him. Clark raised his hand to point at the ring on the floor, and Bruce flinched. Not a large flinch. Just a small instinctive reaction to Clark's upraised arm. Anyone else might not even have seen it. But Clark saw. And in the same moment he saw the lurid bruises on Bruce's upper arms, where he had been pinned to the mattress before. They were spectacularly colored, a yellow chartreuse shading almost to a lime green at the edges, where. . . 

Lime green.

Lime green like Bruce's tie. "Like your tie," Clark said numbly, and Bruce's eyes flicked up.

"Your tie," Clark said. "I've seen it. You—hang on." He left Bruce there and went to his dressing room. He pushed through the shelves, flipped open the tie racks. Was it another hallucination? How stupid to think that he could find it, that it would be here. But if it were—if he could hold in his hands just that little bit of memory—

Luscious green silk brushed his fingers, and trembling, he tugged it out. He wanted to laugh. He wrapped it around his hand like a bandage. "Careful," Bruce said from the doorway, where he stood watching. "That's Charvet."

"You wore it with the charcoal gray," Clark said rapidly. "You offered me a suit, and I—I can't remember if I wore it or not. Something about the symphony? Or no, not enough time to go back to Metropolis. Why? Never mind, doesn't matter. No, I came in here to get clothes for you—you had fallen in the shower, you should have been wearing the brace, why didn't you wear it? Did I make the right decision, about the surgery? Dick was so angry, and Jason doesn't come, and I tried to leave your bathrobe on but it kept slipping off, and—"

He stared at Bruce, stunned by what was happening in his brain: like a neural lightning storm, nothing ordered or coherent, just a jumble of images and sounds and smells and emotions, this time there were actual emotions underneath them all, it was like having sound with the movie for the first time, and it was too much, he couldn't, he couldn't—

He fell to his knees, clutching at his head, the tie still wrapped around his hand. "It hurts," he gasped, and Bruce was there, holding him—no, he was holding Bruce, Bruce needed him, Bruce was in pain, Bruce Bruce _Bruce_. . .

"'M sorry," he murmured, as he slipped into the blackness.

* * *

Dick sat in the breakfast room, wondering what he would have to pour into his coffee to be able to taste it. Jason sat beside him, evidently having the same thought, because after a few minutes he got up, walked down the hall, and came back with a decanter of vodka. He poured a splash into his coffee, and offered it to Dick, who did the same. 

"Breakfast of champions," Jason murmured. Dick nodded, but something caught in his throat and seized there. He turned his face away. Jason's hand slid onto his thigh and rested there, squeezing him. So here it was: Jason was finally being openly physically affectionate with him, in a decidedly non-brotherly way, here in the Manor itself, and all it took to accomplish that was Clark's death.

"I can't do this," Dick said, the hot claws back at this throat, and Jason's hand tightened. 

"You can," he said. "You will. Bruce needs you to."

Dick shook his head. If it could only be two hours ago, and he could still be in bed—Jason's bed, with Jason's arms around him. So many conversations he should have had with Bruce. Surely Bruce knew, by this point. 

Hal walked into the kitchen and sat at the table with them, staring at nothing. Dick was afraid to say _how is he_ , lest he hear an answer he couldn't bear to hear right now. Then Hal got up and got himself a coffee mug, only he sat back down and reached for the vodka decanter, filling his mug. "Cheers," he murmured. 

"He still holding on?" Jason said, because Jason was always the brave one. Jason's hand had slid off his leg when Hal walked into the room, but it wasn't like Hal would care. He was staring out the window anyway, seeing nothing. How strange to see Hal's normally open face snapped shut like a book, with nothing to read on it. 

"Yeah," he said hoarsely.

"How's Bruce?" Jason continued, and then Hal turned to look at him, and he didn't have to say _how the fuck do you think_ , because his face said it for him. 

Going on a week now. Clark was strong; his body didn't want to die. When Clark had collapsed, Bruce's first thought had been to get him to the cave's solar bed, and there he still lay: stretched out on it, the bed cranked to full blast, Clark's broken body absorbing none of it. Clark himself, drifting in and out. And Bruce, who only left his side to use the bathroom. Bruce, who looked more like death than Clark. _I don't think he's going to survive this_ , Dick had murmured last night into Jason's chest, and Jason's arms had closed on him tighter. 

_I sure as hell wouldn't._

Dick had gripped him tighter too. _Sorry I'm here again. I know it's breaking the rules_. The rule said, one night a week, no more. They had agreed to it years ago. They had both agreed. But Jason had just laughed, last night.

_Yeah, Dickie. Because when you're homosexually incestuously fucking your brother, it's important to follow the rules._

_Well, when better, I'd say_. 

Jason had laughed again. _Speaking of that fucking_ , he had murmured. _Not that this isn't great too. But I'm hard as fuck, can we get off for a minute here?_

_You wanna get fucked?_

_Hell yes._

And for a minute, being buried in Jason's groaning, writhing body had almost erased everything else—at the moment of orgasm had in fact erased everything else. They didn't do it as often as the other way around, but God, Dick loved it like this, because Jason only wanted it one way: face down, humping the mattress while Dick fucked him, and Jason came soon and hard like that. Nothing felt like the sweet clench of Jason's body on his cock, nothing sounded like the sweet guttural obscenities Jason's mouth poured into the mattress.

Dick let himself remember as he drank his vodka coffee. He wondered what would happen if he just said, _Jason, fuck the rules, can we just be real about what is going on here and has been going on for years_. He wondered if Jason would look at him and say, _I thought you'd never ask_ , or if that would get him a roll of the eyes.

He finished the bitter liquorish dregs of his coffee and pushed back from the table. He headed down the stairs to the cave, because he had been away long enough.

He saw what he expected to see, and what he had seen when he had left seven hours ago, for some rest and comfort in Jason's arms: Clark stretched pale and gray on the solar bed, all other lights in the cave dimmed. Bruce sitting beside him, watching, impassive, unrelenting. Like he could will the sunlight into Clark's body. On the cot near the monitors, Martha was curled asleep. Alfred was sitting in a chair against the wall, his had tipped back, eyes closed. Bruce's eyes were the only ones awake in the cave—Bruce's eyes that were terrible to see, hollow and on fire and desperate. 

Dick slid a hand on Bruce's shoulder. "Get some rest," he said. "I'll stay with him." Bruce didn't even bother shaking his head. They had had this conversation too many times. So wordlessly Dick went to the living quarters behind the sliding rock wall and opened the fridge in there, pulling out one of Alfred's stock of protein drinks. He hoped it was one of the ones with Martha's new recipe in it. He went back and handed it to Bruce, who took it as silently. 

"He was awake for a bit this morning," Bruce said after a while, trying to whisper, but his voice was so hoarse and cracked it was barely audible. Dick got up and fetched him a bottle of water, and that he drank. 

The times when Clark was awake were harder, almost, than the times he was unconscious. Harder because now, the confusion was finally gone. There was no more instability, no more anger, no more wild flailing. He had his memories back, now when they could do him absolutely no good. He was simply Clark again, here at the end. When he was awake, he would rest his hand in Bruce's and they would quietly talk, their heads bent close, low murmurs Dick couldn't catch most of the time. Sometimes they smiled about something, and once Clark even laughed—a gentle breath of sound. Sharing old memories, most likely. Maybe even stories about him, when he was young. And then Clark's eyes would drift shut again, and Bruce would bow his head to the mattress, and Dick would look away.

He had no idea what to say to Bruce now, or how to help. Tim was even worse: Tim's reaction was a kind of stubborn anger, and Damian was so lost, all he did was stay in his room with Titus, or take Titus for long walks, or sit outside with his long arms curled around his longer legs, brooding. 

At least he came by that honestly. 

Hal was better than anyone at persuading Bruce to rest, occasionally. Hal was the one who had brought an extra cot and put it beside Clark's bed, and gently forced Bruce down onto it, once Bruce had seen that he could still hold Clark's hand while he rested. Dick sat on the cot now, and watched Bruce. "Diana called, earlier," he said, and Bruce nodded absently. "She'll be here later this morning."

"Well," Dick said. "You should. . . get some rest." Bruce must be tired of hearing people say that, if he was even still hearing anyone but Clark. Awkwardly Dick rose, and gave his shoulder another squeeze, and went back up the stairs. He could see that Bruce's eyes were sliding shut as he sat there, and maybe he could catch a few minutes' sleep if Dick left him.

* * *

He woke to the small shift in Clark's breathing that told him he was awake. He blinked to clear his head. "You should have woken me up," he said. They had agreed that Clark would rouse him, whenever he was conscious and Bruce was not. It was little enough time they had. 

"Only been awake a second," he said easily. His face was unlined, and at least he was in no pain. Hadn't been for about three days now. _You need to write some of this down_ , Clark had said. _You should record the progression of kryptonite poisoning, in case there are ever any other cases._

Bruce had said nothing to that. What was there to say? There was no need to write any of this down, because it was burned into Bruce's brain in its every torturous nuance. There was no need to write any of this down, because nothing was going to matter anymore anyway. Clark's eyes were tracking him like they were reading his thoughts.

"I'm sorry about before," he said, for the thousandth time. "For not remembering. For hurting you."

Bruce nodded, because he wouldn't say hush. Wouldn't say hush, as long as that beautifully resonant voice, mangled and wary though it was, continued to speak to him. He knit their hands more closely together, and Clark looked at their joined hands, and the ring on Bruce's. "I wish. . . I wish I knew where mine was," he said. "What they'd done with it, damn them." 

Bruce tugged his off and slipped it onto Clark's finger. Clark tightened his grip, and looked at the silver ring. He smiled weakly. "That's nice," he said, and then he coughed, and Bruce helped him sit up a bit. There was fluid on the lungs. Clark's body was breaking down in a thousand large and small ways, and no one could do anything to help. His physiology was more a mystery than the nitrous moons of Gamma-Twelve. 

"Listen," Clark said. "We need to talk about something."

"I already said I would look after the damn dog," Bruce said, and that wrung a laugh from Clark, which only made him cough again. 

"I meant, you need to rest."

"There'll be time for that later," he said, and Clark gave him a sharp look. There was nothing wrong with Clark's mind anymore, and sometimes that was unfortunate. 

"That better not mean what I think it means," Clark said, and Bruce was silent. "Swear it to me," he said. Bruce was still silent. "Bruce, don't you dare—"

"And you would do any different?"

"Maybe not, but I don't have four sons who need me, and a family to look after. Bruce. Don't—even if you did that to all of them, don't do that to her. I'm asking you. Don't leave my mother without anyone."

"She's not without anyone," Bruce murmured, glancing to where Alfred rested near her cot. But it sounded like a petulant excuse even to his ears, and Clark's grip tightened again. 

"Swear it," he said, and Bruce swallowed.

"Don't ask that of me," he whispered.

"I'm asking it. Swear it."

"You can't ask it."

"I'm asking it. Swear."

"Damn you," Bruce said, and bent his head. Clark was unforgiving, relentless.

" _Swear_."

"I swear," he murmured. 

Clark's breathing eased and deepened. For a minute Bruce thought he had fallen back into sleep. Condemned to a lifetime without Clark. His one comfort stripped from him, the comfort of knowing that when Clark was gone, he could end his own life and at least be done with all this, at least not have to wake up with a lifetime of mornings learning how to breathe without Clark. He had done it for five years; not even Clark could ask it of him anymore. But he had, and Bruce had given his word. Damn him.

"Hey," he said, tugging at Bruce's hand. "Remember when you took me to school about Kon?"

He snorted. "Which time?"

"We met for pie. You made me so mad I left before I ate. I was so angry that you would make me think I was responsible for him."

"You were just angry that I was right about something."

"I was angry that you were right about something to do with feelings. What are the odds?"

"Slim, I grant you."

They lapsed into silence. He ought to let Clark slip back to sleep, but he couldn't bear it. "Hey," he said. "So, we never decided about that honeymoon. Remember? You said you would get back to me, about the island or the mountains. Have you had a chance to think about it?"

"Oh yeah," Clark said sleepily. "Well, I guess the island then. Someplace warm. I'd like to be warm."

"Let's do it," Bruce said. "Right now. I can get you in the plane. Let's just fly away from here. The solar bed—it's not working anyway, we could just go somewhere. . ." His voice died at the flick of Clark's eyes to the small figure resting on the cot. Martha. He wouldn't die somewhere away from her, even if he had wanted to. He wouldn't do that to her. Bruce nodded in understanding.

"Of course," he said. And then Clark's eyes really did slide shut, and Bruce was alone again. He watched Clark's breathing for a bit more, and then let his own head fall to the mattress beside him, surrendering at last to a deeper sleep.

* * *

The cave was still, except for the motion of a solitary figure. Maybe it was that that had roused Clark.

A tall young man, tall as Bruce. That shock of white hair in front. He was just leaning against the stairs, watching as they all slept. Clark had watched him for a good five minutes before he realized Clark was awake. Clark saw the moment where he began to back away, head back up the stairs.

"Jason," Clark said, as clearly as he could without waking Bruce.

The young man made his wary way over to the bed. They stared at each other for a minute. "Two. . . things," Clark managed, and he could feel the hitch in his breath now. Air was getting harder to reach for, with every inhale. He pushed through it. "I need you. . . to do two things."

"I can get Dick, if you need something," he said, and Clark shook his head.

"No, I need you. Listen. It's. . . not going to be much longer. Sooner than Bruce knows. Today sometime."

Jason's jaw tightened, and he nodded. Clark steadied his voice. "He. . . is going to need you."

Jason bit his lip to what Clark imagined must be the blood. "Bruce needs a hell of a lot of things, but I'm not one of them."

"You're wrong. You were always wrong about that. You. . . have to figure that out. He is going to need you. Promise me."

"I'm not doing any of that deathbed promising shit. Just because someone is dying doesn't give them the right to make everyone else's life a living hell."

"Couldn't agree more. Just. . . indulge me a little. Can you hand me something over there? It's that box. See it? It's. . . metal, the rectangular one. There."

With difficulty, he opened it. He turned it to Jason could see it. He saw the boy—no, the man—flinch at its contents. "You know what that is?"

"I've got a pretty good idea."

Clark studied it. At this point, its presence made absolutely no difference to his saturated body. Couldn't even feel a thing. He wondered if that was what had made the New Genesians turns him over to the slave trade, in fact—he had become so saturated with kryptonite that his body had simply stopped responding to it, and they were nervous about having him around without a method of restraint. Not that thy had needed one, by the end. They did their work well. It was hard to beat back the tide of hatred. Hatred for what they had done to him, and what they had done to Bruce. To both of them. 

"It's a syringe filled with liquefied kryptonite," Clark said. "Bruce worked hard to get it to this state. The box keeps it at the correct temperature. The needle on the syringe is kryptonite-tipped, so it will pierce my skin if it needs to, with no trouble. There's enough in here to stop my heart." He closed the box, gathering himself.

"Bruce made this day before yesterday. If things get too bad at the end, he can administer this, and everything will just stop. When I'm ready for it too."

"Okay," Jason said. "Can we please stop talking about this now?"

"No. I'm asking you not to let Bruce do that. Don't make him be the one to do this."

"Oh my God," Jason said. "I do not freaking believe this. Are you—are you seriously about to ask me to off you?"

"I was thinking that you could—"

"Oh my _God_ ," Jason said again. "What _is_ it with you people? Why does everyone assume _I_ am the perfect person for this job? Am I seriously the only homicidal maniac you people know?"

"Jason, I don't—"

"Oh, give me the goddamn box," he said, swiping it back. "Spare me the rest of the speech. Yes, fine, whatever, I'll do it. The things I do for this family, I swear."

Clark gave a lopsided smile at that, because of what Jason had inadvertently said. Like it or not, they were family. "He loves you so much," Clark said. "Please. Look after him for me."

Jason turned his face away. It looked strangely taut. "How about you not fucking die," he said. 

"Tried that. Am trying. There's such a thing as. . . reality. You of all people know that."

"Yeah well, since when has this family ever had any interest in reality. Okay, look, fine, I'll. . . do your thing, all right? Just. . . stop talking and get some rest. You look like hell."

"Dying will. . . do that to you."

Jason nodded. And then he did something Clark was not expecting: he extended his hand. Clark shook it with his left, because his right was currently entangled with Bruce.. He saw Jason glance at the wedding ring, and the corner of his mouth twitched in what might have been a smile, or might have been just a general acknowledgement of the universe's bleak irony. Then Jason was gone, and Clark could relax, and slip back to sleep. 

If he was lucky—if Bruce was lucky—it would happen while he slept, and there would be no final throes, no last gasping breaths that Bruce or anyone else would have to here. Well, that was why he had Jason, to make sure it was that way. 

In his last conscious thoughts, he was walking into the diner, and Bruce was waiting for him at their usual table. Only that wasn't right—he would be the one waiting at the table for Bruce. Maybe he would have to wait a long time, and that was all right. It was better that way.

He settled in to wait.

* * *

Bruce woke, and knew Clark would not wake again.

He didn't know how he knew it. Maybe some sense connected them; maybe some thread had been woven at their wedding, or maybe it had been years before. But he knew, even before he lifted his head.

Martha was gone from her cot, and Alfred from his chair. Impossible to know the time, but it was probably later on in the afternoon, though of which day he could not have said. He raised his head and looked at Clark, sleeping peacefully. His breathing was shallow, his color so gray now he was almost ash-colored. Bruce lifted his hand and held it tight, and Clark did not shift, he was so deep under. 

He reached for Clark's other hand, wanting to hold that too, to grip onto as much as he could in the time he had left. The feel of his ring on Clark's finger was comforting. He knew he wouldn't remove it. Let Clark be buried with it; he himself didn't need a ring. It wasn't like he needed to wear something on his hand to be reminded, every day, of where his heart lay.

His hand. 

He stared at Clark's hand for a minute before he fully comprehended what he was looking at. He blinked. He could feel wheels grinding in his brain, long-disused parts of himself coming back online. _Think_. If only he could _think_ , if only he could _understand_ what he was looking at. . . 

Clark's left hand was as gray and lifeless as his right, with one obvious difference: his fourth finger. Radiating out from the knuckle was a circle of healthy, warm, gloriously pinkish flesh—as porcelain and blue-veined as Clark's skin had always been. It was like punching through the dark crust of the Earth's surface to find molten lava roiling beneath.

He blinked some more, and stared. There was nothing different about that one finger. There was no magic in a wedding ring, which after all was just a symbol. There was nothing different about their wedding rings from a thousand others, except. . . 

He stood so fast his chair hit the floor. 

" _Dick!_ " He shouted. " _Alfred!_ " He stumbled to the monitors, banging them to life, opening every communication channel he could think of. Hal's hesitant face sprang into view on the left monitor.

"Bruce? Is it—? Has he—?"

"Get me Vic," Bruce said. "Immediately. He should be able to do this. Projectors. I need projectors, all along the walls of the cave, and I need them now, like in fifteen minutes. I'm going to need at least a dozen, maybe more. Get Barry, we'll need his speed. Get—" _Think_ , he had to _think_.

"Bruce, what's going on?" Dick on the stairs, clattering down—Alfred behind him, and Martha—who else would he need, how could he explain—

With a few keystrokes, he had every monitor in the cave covered with what they needed to see. He was yanking open drawers for paper, for something to write with—why did every damn thing he owned have to be so digital, he would have to fix that, had to find something to write with—

"Write," he said, thrusting a piece of paper and a pen into Alfred's hands. They were standing there gaping at him, looking back and forth between him and Clark. They must have assumed Clark had already died, and that was why he was shouting. He had no time for their slowness. " _Write_ ," he said again. "Everything you see on that screen. It's an alphabet, the Kryptonian alphabet. Can you copy it?"

"I. . . Bruce, what's going on?" Martha looked frightened, confused. He was yelling at them. Probably he should be yelling. Clark wouldn't like that. 

"Like this," he said, seizing a piece of paper. He wrote as many letters as he knew off the top of his head, though there were sixty-eight of them, he didn't have all of them memorized. "See? As carefully as you can, making sure you've got everything right."

"I don't—what are we—"

"So we can do _this_ ," Bruce said, and he took his piece of paper and pressed it, letter-side down, to Clark's sickly-cold flesh. He pressed as hard as he could. "See? It's the letters, don't you see, it's—how can I explain, it's—"

"Kabbala," Tim said in dawning wonder, on the stairs behind Dick, and " _Yes_ ," Bruce said. "The letters, it's the letters themselves, I don't have time to explain, just do it! I can get projectors, Vic can do that with no trouble, we can project them onto every inch of his skin, it's the cure, don't you see that? There isn't time to—just DO WHAT I SAY!"

They worked feverishly, and Bruce had no idea if the paper idea would actually work, but surely, surely it was a stopgap until he could come up with something better. He scrawled Kryptonian as fast as his hands could write, and pressed his paper right over Clark's heart—no way to secure it there, who knew if it was deep enough, if he had miscalculated and it was the platinum of the rings rather than the letters themselves then he would encase Clark's body in platinum, but he wasn't wrong, he couldn't be wrong, there wasn't time to be wrong, he had only this one chance to be right when being right had never mattered so much. 

And maybe he was wrong, and everyone looking at him now like his mind had finally come unglued, maybe they were right. But it was a sliver of hope, and he was going to hold onto it, for the hours that he still could.

It was a curious thing, how hard hope was to kill. 

"Do what the man says," Jason said, stepping forward into the silent group and grabbing a piece of paper. "Let's do this thing."

* * *

Clark woke to pain.

There were a thousand small knives wedging themselves into his skin, and he sat up, gasping at it. He breathed in against the pain, and he was astonished to find that it was air—sweet, blessed air—filling his lungs. "What the—stop, this, it hurts," he gasped.

"I'll bet it does," Bruce said distractedly, over at the monitors. He was frantically typing something, and glancing overhead, up to the ceiling, where—there was something on Clark's skin.

He looked down and gasped again. There were small dark snakes dancing all over his skin. "What is happening—Bruce, stop, what are you doing—"

"Not going to stop," he said. "So lie back down. I need you to be still for this part. Vic, do you have that fifth projector on line?"

"Just finishing up," the voice called, and Clark turned around—ow, more pain, pain in every muscle—to see Cyborg hovering near the ceiling of the Batcave. There were more of the dancing black snakes covering every available surface of the cave, projected from the ceiling, and Clark looked at his skin in puzzlement, nut understanding, until—

His skin.

He could see it, underneath the dancing letters, because he was awake enough now to see what they were, and to understand what was happening. They were letters, Kryptonian letters, and underneath the letters, his skin was glowing and healthy and normal-colored again, and the pain. . . 

The pain was the radiation in the solar bed, finally flooding his body in every pore. 

He sank back onto the bed and let the activity around him continue. There were people talking loudly over in the other corner of the cave—Hal, and Diana, and Barry, and Oliver, and Dinah, and next to Bruce was Jason, and they were working on something together, periodically turning to each other and nodding, pointing at something on the screen. 

"How're you feeling?" said a warm voice at his ear, and he turned to see his mother, who had been there all along, her hand stroking his head. 

"Ah. . . not so great, actually," he said. 

"That's the radiation," Leslie said, from the foot of his bed. She was making notes on a pad, typing as fast as Bruce. "Sorry about that, but any painkillers will just depress your respiration, which is not a good idea until the rest of the fluid on your lungs drains off. Try to lie back and relax."

He raised his arm and looked at the letters dancing across it. "I'm assuming there's an explanation for this," he said. 

"An excellent one," Bruce said, sliding his chair Clark's direction. "Mainly having to do with my deductive acuity, to which you owe your life."

Clark turned his head to see Hal standing beside him now, and Barry grinning wide, and Diana reaching out a hand to stroke his head beside his mother's hand. "He's going to be insufferable now, isn't he," he said weakly, and Hal grinned.

"Completely." And Hal clasped his hand, gripping him tight. "Man, you have no idea how good it is to see you awake."

"Stop touching him," Bruce said in irritation. "You're getting in the way of the projectors, all of you. Move back."

"Oh hush," his mother said, and Bruce did, because apparently defiance of Martha Kent was not something he was willing to sign up for. Bruce was smart like that. 

"Yes I am," Bruce replied. Apparently he had said that last part out loud. He was still a bit woozy. There was something of a party atmosphere in the cave, with everyone talking at once. He didn't remember the League being this loud. 

"Explain to me what is happening," he said.

"How much do you know about Kabbala?"

"Well, when I left Earth it was Madonna's religion, but that was a long time ago, it may be something else now."

"It's not a religion," Bruce said testily. "It's a mystical tradition within a religion, much like Sufism within Islam. Kabbala teaches that the Hebrew alphabet contains mystical forces, and that the letters themselves have power—to heal, to create, to destroy. I don't know anything about Kryptonian religion, or at least not as much as you do, but I took a chance that some of the same principles might be at work here.  
Your system is responding to the physical presence of the Kryptonian alphabet, for no reason that I can think of other than we are only just beginning to understand your physiology. I'm sure there are some rabbis who will be very interested in talking to you, though."

"What about Madonna?"

"Not so much. Try to lie still."

"Still hurts," he muttered.

"Your pain receptors are probably skewed," Bruce said. "It's not that bad. _Off_ , you idiot," he said to a furry white head that plopped itself on Clark's leg. "Damian, I told you to keep these dogs out of here. Titus, no, _leave it_ , that's my—dammit, that dog just ate my sandwich _again_. Damian!"

Clark started laughing. He couldn't help it. Laughing was somehow even more painful than sitting up had been, but he couldn't stop. "You're messing with the projection," Bruce growled, but that just made him grin more, because over in the corner of the cave Ollie was telling some wild story that involved much waving of arms and gesticulating, and Hal was grinning like a loon, and Bruce was back to growling at him, and Titus was chewing a stupid sandwich with mayonnaise on his flappy jowls, and poor Damian was trying to chase the canine malefactors around million-dollar equipment while his father yelled at him, and everything was just so gloriously normal and at the same time so completely messed up that he couldn't stop laughing. 

"Not experiencing some sort of mental event, are you," Bruce said, while reaching for Leslie's pad.

"I think. . . definitely yes," Clark said. "I think the damage could be permanent."

Bruce shot him a wry look, and Clark reached for his hand. Bruce knocked it away. "Projection," he muttered, still making notes. Clark sighed. But then Bruce's hand slid toward his, careful not to block any of the projected letters swimming across his skin. Their fingers laced together, just the tips, and Bruce's thumb stroked the side of his thumb, and he could feel it, really feel it in all his pores and cells and neurons as he hadn't in. . .he couldn't even calculate the years. His eyes drank in Bruce's, and he couldn't look away, and neither apparently could Bruce. There was a small unstoppable smile that kept twitching at the corner of Bruce's mouth, and he wanted to kiss it, to taste it, to lick at it until he heard Bruce's moan of pleasure. 

"You're going to want to think about something other than what you're thinking about," Bruce said in a voice that was low and only for his ears, because Clark was naked with no sheet covering him at all, and somehow he was only just realizing that, and why was the cave filled with every single person he knew, again? He took a deep breath—how amazing, how beautiful that he could do that—and worked on not thinking about Bruce's mouth, so that the swell of his cock could subside. 

He shifted a little, which brought the stabbing pain back, and that took care of his incipient erection. He winced. "It actually does hurt quite a bit," he murmured.

Bruce's wry smile was back, and he leaned closer. "Shut up being such a pussy about it," he murmured, and Clark laughed so loud at the memory that everyone turned to look, and he knit his hand more firmly in Bruce's, and pulled Bruce's hand to his mouth and kissed it. Let them see, let them all see. He caught Dick's grin, and Hal's smile, and Diana was looking at them both warmly, and he let his eyes slide shut, certain that when he opened them next there would only be more of the same miraculous bliss that was flooding him now.

"I'm going to take a nap," he announced.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Only the epilogue left to go! I just wanted to reassure readers that there wasn't something ELSE awful about to happen. :)


End file.
